American Horse Council Website Redesign

UX/UI Design, WordPress Development

American Horse Council

American Horse Council Website Redesign
Role: UX/UI Designer, WordPress Development

Background: The American Horse Council is the only national association exclusively representing every segment of the vast equine industry in Washington, DC. This important national organization needed a website redesign due to feedback from users and internal staff finding it hard to navigate.

Problem: Through user interviews that I conducted, the website was hard to navigate and find important information. Internally, the website was hard to update content. 

Process & Solution: Conducted extensive research on the look and feel of other national organization websites. Conducted a full audit of the existing site. Conducted user interviews to discover what the pain points were on the website. Received internal feedback that the website was hard to update. Created a site map, an affinity map, persona, user journey, wireframes and a final design to bring the American Horse Council Website a new look, and an enjoyable experience for users.

Affinity Mapping: On average, users that I spoke to found the website inconsistent, hard to navigate, and difficult to learn about the organization.

Persona
Age: 45
Location: US
Occupation: Horseback riding instructor and barn owner/manager

Bio:
Jane Doe is a 45 year old woman from the US who is a professional in the equine industry. She owns her own boarding facility and gives horseback riding lessons. She is concerned about the state of the industry, and how local laws and political issues can affect her business in her area.

Wants & Needs:
Jane enjoys her career, loves horses, and enjoys teaching others how to ride, and raising up the next generation of equestrians. Jane wants to gain more knowledge on political issues that could affect her business and industry. She wants to get involved in an organization that represents her and people like her. She does not want the equine industry to fall by the wayside and be under represented in terms of law making, land development, and other important issues.

Pain Points & Frustrations:
As a working equine professional, she is incredibly busy and has limited time to conduct research online. When websites aren’t easily scannable, Jane gets frustrated since she is limited on time. She wants to get involved in an organization that makes a real difference on a national and federal level and she is finding it hard to make a decision on which organization to join and donate to.

Organizations she is apart of:
USEF, her local PHA chapter, the AQHA

User Journey:

Design System: The original AHC colors were not ADA Compliant, so I made sure that the new colors were compliant, but staying true to their original brand colors. The original website was using non-web friendly fonts so I streamlined their typographic styles. It was also incredibly hard to find links within paragraphs, so I included a link style in the design system.

Site Map:

Prototype: