A digital experience to match a refined brand
UI/ UX
Web Design
Note: All quotes in this case study are taken from the WWC Global podcast, which featured Josh and Adam from Chalkbox on a recent episode. You can listen directly here, or check out all of WWC Global’s podcasts on the firm’s website.
Lauren Weiner and Donna Huneycutt, founded WWC Global in 2004 and have been personally involved in every aspect of the company’s growth during the last sixteen years.
From recruiting to budgeting, pricing to new business, every aspect of the federal contracting firm’s expansion has been calculated and planned. In an industry focused on connections and reputation, marketing was often put on the backburner. “We gain new business based on our performance and client feedback,” said Lauren. “A sleek website and materials did not feel immediately necessary as a small business.”
This outlook changed as the company expanded from five individuals to over 250 employees. “As we continue to gain new contracts, our growth has aligned us with bigger firms,” said Donna. “We realized we needed to communicate our capabilities and team in a more sophisticated manner.”
It really hit home when a potential business partner said he nearly didn’t return a call to WWC Global because the website was so dated. “We realized it mattered,” Lauren said.
It matters even more for a firm like WWC Global, which provides management consulting services to the federal government and employs 250 people in 24 locations on four continents. While it has a large global scope, it’s still “small” in the realm of federal contractors. But the company has its sights set much higher.
That’s why Lauren, Donna and their business partner, Heidi Snell, initially approached Chalkbox—they knew that to eventually play in a bigger sandbox, and compete with long-established and well-known consulting firms, WWC Global needed to look the part. After we designed a new brand identity for the company (you can read about that here), the next step was to build a website with the new brand elements, updated content, and a more accessible, intuitive structure.
A complex challenge
We knew right away the WWC Global site would be a complex digital experience. It needed to incorporate a lot of moving parts, a lot of content, and appeal to a lot of different people—because today’s diverse audiences interact with digital content in a wide variety of ways, on countless types of devices.
We started by revisiting the creative brief we developed at the beginning of the identity project, diving deeper into WWC Global’s audience to develop user personas and journeys. Both of these tools help designers create an intuitive, engaging site by understanding and planning how viewers will move through the digital experience, how they will interact with content, and what the pain points are.
We performed additional competitor research as well—this time focusing on how the company’s future competitors shape the digital experience of their viewers. We evaluated what was working and what wasn’t, using our findings as a starting point to determine features and functionality for the WWC Global site.
Finally, we also considered how the website could extend and reinforce the message projected by the new brand identity: WWC Global is credible, confident, precise, and effective. This is particularly important given the company’s leadership makeup, which is unique in the federal contracting space.
From wireframes to prototypes
When WWC Global’s marketing team finished the site content, we worked together and utilized our user journey maps to shape the overall information architecture—basically, how the content is arranged. Next, we constructed wireframes, a loose blueprint of the site that helps bring it to life for both designers and clients. What will this page look like? How will this page be different from that one? What will the navigation experience be? There’s no substitute for actually seeing it on the screen.
Just as they were during the identity project, everyone at WWC Global was open to collaboration throughout this process. “It’s been an extremely solid relationship through the entire development,” Heidi said. “Chalkbox guided us in every single aspect of the project and offered innovative ideas during each step of the process.”
We refined the wireframes through energetic meetings with the company’s marketing and leadership teams, and once we had a solid plan, began building prototypes.
A sleek, intuitive experience
The finished website (https://wwcglobal.com) is sleek and intuitive, with content that is both easy to access and attractive. Several areas of the site feature animated content that draws the eye and engages viewers, while the overall feel is upscale and premium. Most important, it is a compelling extension of WWC Global’s brand identity—giving potential clients and partners confidence that the company is the right fit with the right capabilities.
This project was an excellent example of the difference between working with an individual graphic designer versus a design firm, even a small one such as Chalkbox. Because we have greater capacity than a freelancer or a single designer, we are able to not only take on more complex projects, but also easily manage additional requests. That’s vital for consistency and efficiency; we had already established a strong rapport with the team, and we were able to use prior research and learnings to inform our new work.
The new presence—both online and overall—gives Lauren and others at the company more confidence, too.
‘What we're doing here can stand up’
“We were doing business with one of the big consulting firms and the level of beauty in their pitch decks gave you a feeling of competence and confidence in the ability to do this work,” she said. “We needed to be close to or at that level. I am fairly confident that what we’re doing here can stand up comfortably next to what they do.”
Lauren G. Weiner, Ph.D, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, WWC Global
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