Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton (RCGT) is a Canadian firm that operates in the assurance, tax, advisory, and business recovery sectors, and they are part of the firm Grant Thornton International Ltd. One of their digital services divisions, RCGT Consulting, was undergoing a brand redesign to become “Oxaro”. This project was focused mostly on their website’s UX redesign to follow UX best practices for navigation, client conversion, talent attraction, and overall user experience. Minimal UI work was involved but the main focus was UX optimization.
Because their marketing team had already established a brand with styles, themes, color pallets, imagery, copy, and overall product vision, my main mission was to provide a UX redesign to optimize their visitors’ experience.
framework
I went through a series of stakeholder interviews where I gathered information, mainly from their Director of Business Development and their Chief Technology Officer. Some of the key findings were:
- Their main audience is comprised of Canadian Government agencies, which meant that they needed a simple, straight-forward website where such clients could access information quickly and easily.
- They were having issues with clients not knowing what kind of services they provided. Their only way to show their services was through a small dropdown menu, and their services were not showcased anywhere else on the site.
- When clients expressed their desire to establish communication, additional effort was needed as clear call to action links were non-existent. The only place to contact them was on the “Contact Us” page, and the sole means of reaching them was through the email address and phone number provided on the website as static images. There were no actionable items for this, thus creating friction that could be eliminated.
Below are some of the main findings on the previous site that when improved, could significantly optimize the site’s overall UX.
- There was a small menu containing extra pages that could be consolidated into two total pages. Showcasing their services in other places throughout the site could increase their visibility. “Confused Clients” was the primary issue for which they needed a solution and distributing this information on this menu proved to be an opportunity for improvement.
- In the “About Us” section, their team descriptions had different text alignment issues, inconsistent margins, and excessive text in each paragraph; this needed to be optimized for better readability.
- The “Contact Us” page only contained images of their phone number and email, as well as their physical addresses, forcing users to leave their site and open their emails separately to send inquiries, for example. The only way to tell where they were located at a quick glance was by looking at a static photo showing a 3D aerial view of their offices on a map. Adding actionable items such as contact forms, buttons, Google map API, and actionable email addresses, would drastically reduce friction at the time of contacting them or finding their location easily.
- The site’s footer was a static image. I saw an opportunity here to optimize this space for better navigation and to allow any visitor to get the right information at a glance.
define
Establishing this as the most important user flow was the main optimization step to reduce friction at the time of contacting Oxaro. This process was aimed to drastically increase their revenue generation.
research solutions
A thorough analysis of award winning website designs was conducted. This paved the way to find what other sites that operate in similar spaces were doing correctly. With a clear understanding of the problems to solve, multiple agency and services sites were inspected with the goal to find best UX practices to reduce confusion and present information clearly.
https://www.spinxdigital.com/blog/best-website-design/
Other secondary UX optimization opportunities that Oxaro requested involved attracting candidates to apply to their open jobs.
For this step I researched Forbes World's most desirable companies and analyzed their careers page. If companies on the list such as Southwest Air, Microsoft, or Samsung were on this list, I saw this as an opportunity to potentially implement some of their employee attraction ideas on this project.
prescribe solutions
Because UI work wasn’t needed as much for this project, low-fidelity mockups were created with the intention to show new structures, navigation best practices, potential eye-catching solutions, and other discoverability solutions.
The idea for the following UX solutions was to capture potential clients’ attention and inform them with minimal friction and effort. These were directly tied to my pre-defined user flow.
- I suggested starting with an eye-catching video or video loop on the homepage alongside a large logo that forced visitors to scroll bellow the fold to view more. Then, the navigation becomes a sticky element throughout the site after scrolling.
- After listening to one of their key stake holders’ explanation and purpose for their logo (an embodiment of a power button) I provided this logo animation.
- With a well-defined user flow to increase client conversion and revenue, the next solution entailed incorporating a prominent toggle element at the center of the screen.
- This toggle allowed for the presentation of Oxaro’s services along with concise introductions that highlighted their value propositions. These sections were accompanied by a "learn more" Call to Action button (CTA) which directed prospective clients to dedicated information screens that provide detailed insights about each respective service.
- From there, the next suggestion was to add a “contact us” CTA at the bottom of each service screen to allow potential clients to inform themselves first, and then hire Oxaro’s services seamlessly if they so desired.
- Another suggestion for this client included having large, attractive images at the top of their “Join Our Team” page, alongside value proposition copy, similar to the sites I had researched already for Forbes’ most desirable companies to work for.
- Oxaro’s team would provide their own images and copy, but the idea is to catch users’ attention and persuade them to want to learn more about their career opportunities.
- The “Contact Us” page needed actionable items, thus as mentioned earlier I suggested including solutions as seen on this low-fidelity mockup.
- Ability to click email links, social links, fill out a form with direct inquiries, view and interact with maps to find out their location, etc.
As part of this project, I was asked to include a short list of UX best practices that they were missing or not implementing on their current site. Their idea was to keep these as a reference for future projects, page additions, or other web-based products that they might need in the future.
1. Use location indicators
2. Use hover states or indicate further possible action
3. Provide local navigation menus/items for closely related content.
*For example, use toggle items to showcase different service types while users are still in the “Home” page.
4. Call to Action (CTA) buttons
*Reduce friction and guesswork by adding clear call to action buttons that are connected to your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). For example measure the number of sales or prospects generated by adding the buttons shown above.
The main idea is to direct your users to where they can get the closest possible to your KPIs.
5. Call to Action (CTA) buttons
*Give your users a full and familiar experience; allow them to navigate through your site regardless of their current location and provide shortcuts to contact you easily.
