The Challenge

Update the website to make it simpler to navigate and get critical information. Redesigned current online adoption process to make the process of completing an application seem less onerous.

The Outcome

A redesigned website that is more modern and easier to use. Introduced multi-step online applications that break down the information needed into smaller chunks to make the adoption process more usable.

Focus

The Greyhound Adoption Center (or GAC) is a San Diego-based non-profit organization dedicated to rescuing, rehabilitating, and rehoming racetrack greyhounds from around the world. Often these dogs come off the track and are either used for medical testing purposes or worse, killed. Many of them are injured during their racing careers and do not always receive the best medical care.

As a non-profit, GAC had three primary priorities to address with their website. The first was to educate the community about the plight of these dogs and to try to find safe and loving homes for these wonderful dogs. The current website has a great deal of information; however, it is dispersed across multiple secondary and even tertiary pages that makes finding information difficult. Also, the level of detail is often beyond what most people are looking for when initially introduced to the center.

The second was to keep their operations afloat and develop quick and easy mechanisms to enable interested visitors to support their efforts. Currently, the tiered membership and donation structure can be confusing and requires multiple clicks to get to the forms for making a donation.

Finally, the third area for redesign was the form used for the adoption application. The application process for adoptions is a long scrolling form that begins on one page and then opens up another page that scrolls. This experience may deter potential visitors from applying. The form was not fully validated, and there is no progress indicator to inform the user about how much more there is to complete.

Process

This project entailed a redesign of the full website from both a strategic rethink of the organization's approach to membership and a design perspective to simplify the website including the process of adoption. As part of my process, I completed the following steps:

Strategy. Analyzed existing services and other non-profit organizations providing similar types of functions to create a messaging strategy and positioning. The analogues were used to understand not only how others are different, but also to determine what not to do in making the site usable.

Design. Reviewed the current website and materials to understand how the organization describes itself today and determine how well the message correlates to how the organization operates and how the founders and staff talk about GAC. Analyzed the website structure for ease of use and access to critical information.

Website Development. Drafted requirements including roles, workflows, and user personas. Prototyped and developed initial website front end experience to work with GAC staff, volunteers, and recent adopters to get feedback. Redesigned the forms to expedite the adoption process. Developed a fully validated and multi-step form with progress to create a better experience for the user.

The Deliverable

Reduced website navigation to one level and introduced more white space and minimal placement of images to increase readability.

Minimized amount of information discussed on each subsequent page to the most critical points.

Simplified membership and donation structures to make the process of giving more efficient and easier to use.

Created multi-step forms to reduce the perceived length of the information being gathered and included validation to prevent submission of incorrect of incomplete information.

View the redesigned GAC site