The Challenge

This project undertaken as an employee at Newpath.

In 2022, Access Consultants Australia approached Newpath to develop a new website that focuses on its core values, is easy to navigate and meets the expectations of its members whilst promoting the organisation. Two key audiences were identified and their desirable website features were documented to include:

The primary audience, ACA members, needed a secure members portal that easily allowed for:

Updating their membership portal

Paying membership fees

Paying for CPD events

Lodging CPD activities to register points

For the secondary audience, other visitors, ACA sought to provide them with the ability to:

Easily find an access consultant

Learn about access consulting

Attend both in-person and online events

The Solution

To better understand how to achieve the key goals outlined by ACA, I conducted user persona and optimal user journey workshops. Here, an additional key user, the admin, was identified which assisted me to develop an optimal solution architecture.

Next, I mapped out their existing information architecture to better understand the current issues with the website. From there, I proposed a new information architecture that would serve as the foundation for interface designs.

Building upon the structure of the website, I created minimalistic interface designs that were easy to navigate. As the pages were looking a little sparse, I adapted an existing triangular branding element to add visual interest.

Restructuring the Information Architecture

The biggest issue of the existing website was the inability to access required information easily. It would take a user 4-5 clicks to get to the information they were seeking which is unacceptable for an optimal user experience, but especially for accessibility. During UX research I mapped out ACA’s existing website by clicking on every link, and going to every page to mimic the experience of a user. Needless to say, it was confusing.

So from here, I proposed a new information architecture that removed redundant pages, merged similar content, and created completely new pages. Examples of these changes included:

Consolidating members pages to its own portal within the website

Removing resource pages that consisted of content from other websites as ACA sought to focus on their business content instead

Providing a clear link for prospective members to sign up and find more information

Adhering to WCAG Guidelines

As an association for accessibility, it was crucial the design adhered to WCAG AAA Guidelines. This meant I had to ensure the content was laid out in a cohesive way so assistive technologies could comprehend the structure. To achieve this, actions I took included:

Reading up on the Level 2 AAA Guidelines

Creating a left to right to down layout of content

Ensuring colours had a high enough contrast

Adding alt tags to all images

Assisting the developers to fix any errors using the WAVE Reporting tool

Improving the Backend Workflow

My role for this project extended beyond design as I delved into the world of solution architecture. Assisted by my deep user insights, I was able to research suitable Wordpress plugins that would cohesively work together to fulfil all of ACA's needs. The key requirements for these choices included:

Greater capability to manage memberships

Automation of most processes, eg. certificate generation for attending events

The ability for members to tally CPD points and manually add their own

In addition, I assisted the developers in structuring the Wordpress admin dashboard in a functional way based on the key goals outlined during user persona and journey workshops.