NKCDC
Web Design & Development
Project Overview
Project Goals
- Before coming to Pixel Parlor, NKCDC was managing 5 separate sites for their services. It was our mission to bring all of their services together in one location to improve efficiency for both NKCDC and their clients.
- As of this year, nearly two-thirds of internet searches take place on mobile devices, yet the old NKCDC website was not optimized for mobile viewing.
- In parts of Kensington and the neighborhoods that NKCDC serves, 10% of residents speak Spanish at home, so it was important that the website be translatable and therefore accessible for NKCDC’s Spanish speaking audience.
- Community engagement is what makes NKCDC tick, so the new website needed to serve as an interactive gateway to connect with their community, including support for local businesses, families in need of housing counseling, promoting events both hosted by NKCDC as well as others in the community, and much more.
“Pixel Parlor turned our diverse service lines and a long list of administrative needs into a friendly, cohesive site that immediately began helping us serve more clients. They put up with our numerous delays, staff turnover and changes of scope. The final product, at www.nkcdc.org, allowed NKCDC to retire five outdated sites and bring their content together at one location that looks and sounds like us. As a community nonprofit dependent on government and foundation support, NKCDC is always looking for ways to improve its efficiency with limited funds. All signs show that investing in Pixel Parlor was one of the best financial decisions we could have made.”
Lowell Brown
Communications Manager, NKCDC
A side by side comparison of the NKCDC homepage before (first) and after (second) our redesign
Our Approach
We began, as we always do, with a visioning session to understand their goals and how to address them. During the visioning session we defined project roles to establish main points of contact on both sides, a project calendar with checkpoints geared towards a projected target launch date, and an extensive amount of note taking to ensure that all of the clients needs were accounted for. We took a very hands-on approach by facilitating a cart sorting exercise that distilled the website structure into index cards that allowed NKCDC to reorganize their site organically, and to break down preconceived site structure which allowed their team to move the content into the best, most logical categories moving forward.
A look into our approach to our card sorting exercise (first) and the resulting sitemap (second) stemming from our initial visioning session with NKCDC
A glimpse into the wireframe phase, where a lot of tough decisions are made regarding the information architecture of the website
The Result
The new website instantly helped to alleviate NKCDC’s long list of administrative pain points with its organized admin experience which allows staff from multiple departments to create content and manage pages easily without extensive training. The staff is able to quickly respond to inquiries as each form is funneled directly to the correct departments. In addition, the site immediately began helping NKCDC serve their clients as they saw a huge uptick in housing appointment requests in the first few weeks post-launch.
Increased Engagement 64%
Increased Traffic 27%
Since launch, the NKCDC website has been awarded a 2020 American Web Design Award from GD USA.
Let’s Work Together
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