Emergent Software
Role
UX/UI Designer
Project Duration
January 2023
Tools
Adobe XD
Responsibilities
Research, Wireframing, Low and high fidelity mockups
Project Overview
Emergent Software has expanded their service offerings from software development to offering a full suite of services including software development, cloud transformation, and data engineering. They have also grown their staffing service to the point where it will soon have it’s own identity as a sister company to Emergent Software. Emergent Software needed a homepage redesign with the following goals:
Change the emphasis from being primarily software development to match Emergent Software’s current 3 service pillars.
Refresh the look and feel to be more modern while maintaining consistency with the rest of the website.
Support more content for SEO and marketing purposes.
Starting The Design
Paper Wireframes
I researched Emergent Software and also took a look at some of their direct and indirect competitors. A few things I noticed that competitors had that Emergent Software lacked was a call to action button located in the top nav. Another item I noticed that others had but they didn’t was a contact page on their homepage. I made sure both those were present in my paper wireframes.
Digital Wireframes
After creating numerous iterations of the design, I took elements that I liked from each to create a low fidelity mockup. The elements from my paper wireframes that made it to the next stage were the services section, process timeline, portfolio slideshow and the contact module.
The Final Design
High-fidelity Mockup
My design starts out with a full image up to the fold line. When researching, I found that a lot of custom software websites take advantage of placing a photo or video from the top of the page to the fold line.
One of the goals for the website refresh was to support more content. It was requested that the home page have around 2000+ words but not overwhelm the audience. For the “What we offer” section, I designed a solution that would help support a lot of content but would keep the website short in length. You can toggle between services and technologies and each one has its own set of cards with information on it. When hovering over a card, the color would change to red where you can then click “learn more” to be taken to a new page of information.
One thing that customers love is transparency. I wanted a visual way to show what that the process is like for Emergent Software. I created an infographic timeline to give a visual representation of what it would be like working with Emergent Software.
The original Emergent Software site contained a portfolio section but it was small. I revised this section to be bigger and bolder to grab attention. I also added a testimonial section because reviews and word of mouth go a long way in this industry. This portfolio slideshow would be on a 3 second timer and would rotate between Emergent Software’s featured case studies.
Lastly I ended the page with a contact us section. I wanted to write the content to be more inviting so I used the title “Tell us about your project” to give a subtle push for the client to reach out.
Conclusion
Personal Reflection
This project was a UX/UI design challenge I got assigned by Emergent Software. They asked for a homepage redesign of their current website. Website design is my favorite type of design so I was excited to tackle this challenge. This project was completed in 5 days. The first day was research. The second and third day I created paper wireframe iterations and a digital wireframe. During the fourth and fifth day, I worked on the high fidelity mockups for both the desktop and mobile sites.
What I Learned
Overall I received positive feedback from Emergent Software. There were a few items that I’ll need to add before completing the design. One service that needed to be taken into consideration was their staffing service. They have grown to the point where they would like their staffing service to have its own identity as a sister company to Emergent Software. We talked about possible solutions like creating a call out at the top of the site or having it’s own section on the main site but clicking it would take you to the staffing site. There’s always room for improvement and although this was just a design challenge, I know now to ask more clarifying questions when starting the design process.