Peer Based Harm Reduction WA came to MESH to build a new brand along with their new name  and upgrade their old website to engage their audience and clearly display their services .

Peer Based Harm Reduction WA are a peer-based drug & alcohol agency that specialize in harm reduction. Their focus is on needle exchange, health testing/treatments and drug and alcohol education, alongside many other services. Peer Based Harm Reduction WA prides itself on being trustworthy, non-judgemental, warm and friendly. Being a peer-based organisation, they are able to speak to their consumers with real life experiences, knowledge and an open mind. They wish to express these qualities to their audience through their new website.

The Design and Development Process

Based on our discussions directly with WASUA and the questionnaire the students met with the client and I narrowed down the main goals for the project:

-Accurately represent their services to be conveyed as clearly as possible.
– Organise the content of their website effectively for easy navigation
-Design a welcoming website without being overly professional or similar to their competitors

Through these goals the students aimed to effectively create a website that would support these overall objectives while presenting the client as non-judgmental peers who are experienced and can help those with issues.

An analysis of competitors exposed common functionality issues and revealed that our client wanted to appear more informal than these companies in order to establish better connection and trust with their audience.

Moodboards, wireframes and a site map were developed to create an initial feel for the websites layout in response to the clients goals.

 

After we had received the first version of the client’s content an overall re-categorization of information was needed. Therefore the client and our group engaged in a card sort activity and their content was put into ‘cards’ (sticky notes) and the process involved placing and discussing the position of information. Groups and patterns were quickly identified, unnecessary cards were removed, extra cards were added and an effective navigation system for their new website was successfully created.

Discussions with the client and further experimentation with wireframes (examples shown below) narrowed down the  layout ideas which resulted in a simple layout that clearly displayed who they were and their main services.

After several iterations the middle design comp was chosen as the base for the new theme for our client.

 

 

Client Testimonial

Thanks so much for you hard work on the website, it looks great. You’ve taken on board all our feedback and really captured the spirit of our organization. We are very happy with the end product which represents us as an organization in a much better way than our previous website

Kevin Winder

NSEP Coordinator