In Process: Restorative Justice Mediation Program
A new Squarespace website helps this San Diego-based non-profit organization showcase their important — and innovative — work.
Xiani with San Diego’s Restorative Justice’s Mediation Program reached out to us with interest in having their existing site redesigned.
Restorative Justice Mediation Program is a non-profit organization that provides services based on restorative justice principles with main programs including victim-offender dialogue, support groups, and reentry classes for the incarcerated or recently released.
Their overall hope for this redesign was to modernize their site, clean it up and make it more user-friendly.
Here are a few things they didn’t like about their existing site:
They weren’t able to edit and update the site themselves
It was on a WordPress platform
The site was outdated and barely had any current information
It was cumbersome with lots of pages and content
The experience was overall overwhelming for site visitors
We can see that the same design for the About Us page is brought over to another page (as was the case for the entire existing site). When you have a consistently plain design that repeats across an entire site, visitors get bored easily and have no desire to read loads and loads of text over and over again.
On the Stories page, there are no personal touches. This page doesn’t show us who they are and who they help. It simply lists information out in plain black text on a white background. It’s not engaging to visitors of the site.
Here’s how we’re working to meet their goals:
Consolidating content into easy-to-read, easily digestible snippets
Implementing drop down menus to hold said content so that folx have the ability to quickly get an overview while also allowing them the ability to learn more if they so choose
Adding a calendar with up-to-date events that also pulls in the event’s location so that folx without access to a mobile device can pull the address straight from their site
Updating their existing logo with a more modern feel and bringing in stronger and bolder colors to use site-wide
Using imagery on most pages to help tell their story
Making sure that case submission forms are easy to access from multiple different places on the site
Ensuring that the site is easy to navigate
Instantly we see — in just these three redesigned pages above — an element of life coming into the site. We’ve brought in imagery which adds a visual element to help folx understand what it is that SDRJMP does without needing to read through a lot of content.
We also see an updated color scheme that serves the purpose of easily helping folx identify certain programs based on their color. We see an ease-of-use element coming into play on the new Submit a Form page, as we’ve implemented accotabs to help folx switch between forms and not have to scroll or leave the page to do so.
SDRJMP’s new site is such a beauty to behold. We really worked hard to make sure that we delivered on all of their wants while also making sure they had everything they needed in their new site.
We were able to take their message and use design to help tell their story while also ensuring that no pieces of the puzzle were missing. By bringing in different types of menus, cleaning up their navigation, consolidating their content, and using imagery and colors to revamp the site, we created something that they are not only proud of, but happy with from the first to the last page.
For the full impact, check out the new site here!
