Tools I Used Illustrator, Adobe Xd, HTML/CSS, Javascript, Bootstrap
How Long It Took 3 Months
Project Type Client: mydrivinginstructors.com
My Role Web Developer/Designer
MyDrivinginstructors.com
I worked on a site for a business that gives driving lessons in the Chicagoland area. I aimed to create a design that was memorable and engaging for future students.
Background Mydrivinginstructors.com is a small driving school with students predominantly in the northwestern suburbs. As a branch off of Asia Driving school, it is a smaller business that focuses on behind the wheel training, private one on one sessions with instructors and two hour lessons packed with tips, road advice and pep talks to make students more confident on the road.
Starting With the Bare Minimum This project was first assigned to me as a website that needed to be made for the domain name, mydrivinginstructors.com. Since I had only worked on redesigns prior to this assignment, I couldn't wait to start the process, but was definitely overwhelmed with all the power I had in branding, designing and developing the site. However, I knew that the best way to go about this situation was to think about the target audience for this site, then slowly building up to branding it and finally developing it. That's the very reason why I decided to create user personas to fully understand and grasp where the user was coming from.
Goals for the Redesign:
From the personas and meeting with the client, I gathered that most of the students needed a reliable teacher that was not only informative, but welcoming as well. Because of their background, not only did student seek a good teacher-student relationship, but sought out instructors who could connect with them culturally and linguistically. Keeping this in mind, I decided the best way to go about this was to focus on 4 key goals for the site:
1. Create a website that is informational and organized
2. Include testimonials from past students
3. To have more organization in the content of the site
4. Have a color palette that is exciting and engaging for future students
Through these goals not only would students get the information they need, they would also feel a sense of "comfort" when viewing the testimonials, seeing artwork, and scrolling down an organized site.
Organization/Flow For mydrivinginstructors.com I wanted to create a site that flowed linearly. I felt that a linear site would be most organized and new students could navigate through it easily. From the home page, the about sections was next, followed by the services page, testimonials and contact.
Branding I wanted to use bright colors to engage and welcome new students; yellow was used to show optimism and was paired with turquoise to create a more balanced and calming look. To give the site a more inviting and modern finish, I created flat artwork on illustrator.
Major Key: User Centered Design To be honest, designing, developing and branding this site was an overwhelming and big task, but it helped me understand my strengths and weaknesses as a UX/UI designer. This project was 50/50 in designing and developing, but taking a more user centered approach really paved the way for how I was going to develop the site and in the end made it a lot easier. As someone who now considers themselves more of a designer then developer, this project really showed me the importance of designing with the user in mind, and how thoughtfulness for your audience is what makes a good website...and definitely makes it easier when developing it too.
Check out other projects I've worked on.
Understanding the User: User Personas To fully understand the user and what kind of thoughts, fears and expectations they were having going onto this site, I did a background check on Asia Driving School, the parent institution of this site. Along with notes from my client, it became clear that Asia Driving school catered to a specific audience; South Asian men and woman who depended on schools like ADS to give driving lessons in a language they could easily comprehend. Many of the students either immigrated to the United States or held F1 Visa or H1B visas. Since mostly all instructors were also South Asian, this eliminated any language/ cultural barriers the student would have with another driving school.
Final Site To develop this site I used Bootstrap as a framework and created artwork on Illustrator.
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