Look - feel - usability: say hello to your newly designed platform

We’re not going to lie; navigating our beloved DesignSpark platform sometimes felt like trying to find our way through a city with many roads of the same name, some odd intersections, and illogical layouts here and there. We asked you for your opinion, and you largely agreed. We wanted to listen more and asked you with which other aspects of the site you were dissatisfied with, and you helped us to identify features for various new components that would help you improve your workflow on projects.

In extensive usability testing, surveys and conversations, you told us that besides navigation, search needed improvement and that you found the interface not clean enough and perhaps a little bit too corporate looking. In fact, what DesignSpark offered and who it was aimed at, was not always fully resonating.

So, we dedicated a large amount of the last twelve months making sure we improve your (and our) experience. We stayed attentive to your voice at every stage of the development: before we built, while we built, after we built and will continuously do so.

^{Usability testing: our audiences tested the functionality of our website. The goal was to reveal areas of confusion and uncover opportunities to improve the overall user experience.}

Parallel to the UX work, we reviewed the look and feel of DesignSpark. We very much wanted to come back to you with a visual brand identity that reflects engineering, innovation, out of the box thinking, and a pioneering mindset. With our icon set, our aim is to provide you with information at a glance and a freehand line drawing style that reflects human touch and the design aspect.

^{The goal with the iconised graphics throughout the site was also to make a distinction between user-generated and static content to improve user experience.} 

^{A dedicated secondary colour for each section ensures clear ID of pages. The goal was to improve customer journey and navigation.}

We hope you like what we’ve done up to now; that our recent work results in a happier and more intuitive experience and a look that resonates with you.

Some of the feedback we received in our latest beta testing session:

"Great layout and nice to see the messaging for new visitors."

"I think that the home page is very clear on what DesignSpark is all about."

"Clear and easy to navigate. Tons of information available, which by using the proper search terms, can be pruned down quickly. All of the tools are made easy to find and use. Maybe for the tools, more basic tutorials could be made available."

"It’s very easy to jump from one topic to the other."

"The user is immediately greeted with multiple articles, links, and images of various electronics and mechanical subjects and designs. It is easy to get the idea that DesignSpark is about electronics, prototyping, and engineering."

"The home page is streamlined compared to the classic DesignSpark home page."

"Content of the menu is clear and easy to follow."

"It has a clean look. There is perhaps too much focus on articles, although I have to say that I got sucked into a few that I actually thought were very informative and worthwhile reading."

"Nice and clean looking."

Please share your feedback with us also: