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Freedom Ride Website Redesign

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Freedom Ride

Therapeutic Horse Riding Organization

Overview

Freedom Ride, is a non-profit volunteer-based organization built on the conviction that we are not bound by our physical limitations. Freedom Ride is dedicated to enriching the lives and experiences of children and adults with disabilities in the Central Florida area through therapeutic horseback riding and related activities.

When you enter their website you feel like you’ve gone back in time. Freedom Ride puts a lot of effort into maintaining their goals in the Orlando community, which has left behind their website.

Screen shots of some of the pages in Freesome Ride's website.

What Needs to Improve

List of market featuers and elements that needs to improve.

  • Too many links. The usual amount of links that anyone should be in their navbar is six to seven. Less is more. Freedom Ride has ten links, which is way too many. After looking through the information in all of their tabs, it can easily be shrunken down by organizing where some information goes.
  • Clutter. Just like with the navbar, less is more. Having a lot of information on your website can be overwhelming for the user. Especially your homepage. Some content is repeated throughout the site, which isn't necessary. They'll eventually get overwhelmed and leave. We can take the spring cleaning strategy, figure out what's important, and organize some content.
  • It's all about the money. Organizations are always trying to find different resources of income to continue to help the people in their community. There is a different way to promote it on your page where it doesn't feel like money is your goal. It should be something that supports your message, not overshadow it.
  • Not responsive. Most American users are now on their mobile phones. By now, most websites should be mobile-friendly. It'll increase the amount of time the user spends on your site. While also improving your ranking on search engines.
  • Outdated Design. An out-of-date website can have an impact on how users view your organization. It can make you appear unprofessional and might have users questioning their trust towards the organization. Users aren’t afraid to judge a site at first glance, and you want to use that moment to capture the user’s heart with the mission you are trying to accomplish.

Re-Design

The aim of Freedom Ride's new look is to hit all the key points listed above and continue to improve based on those key points. Responsive design was also created so the site could work on tablets and mobile.

Site Map

Origional Sitemap


Proposed Sitemap


Wireframes

Branding Guide

Freedom Ride needed a brand refresh in its color palette. I took their existing colors and decided to tone down the bright green and blues and found something more friendly and welcoming. While also adding some neutral colors in the secondary color palette to allow for contrast and hierarchy. It also allows giving the eye a rest from just seeing the primary colors.

Logo Redesign

Consistency is important in a brand, but as an organization continues to grow, so should their identity. Updating the current logo adds the fresh look they needed along with their website redesign. I made sure to create a responsive logo to allow Freedom Ride more flexibility with their branding.

Social Media and Marketing Strategy

  • Instagram profile image. Your Instagram profile image is so important on your Instagram. It’s one of the first things that people will notice that they’ll recognize you by. It’s what will set you apart in the story feeds. It’ll help with long term branding recognition. Using the simple icon that was created from Freedom Ride’s new logo will allow users to start associating it to Freedom Ride without needing to put their name on there.
  • Social media postings. Social media is the best way to create exposure for your organization and what’s great about it is that it’s free. It’s the best way to drive traffic to your website.
  • Start using hastags. It’s almost impossible to find a post that doesn’t use at least one hashtag. Why does everyone use it? To increase your chances to be recognized by other users or organizations that support your mission.
  • Link social media accounts to website. Having your social media links on your website allows you to grow your followers. It gives Freedom Ride the opportunity to show their users what their up to, but also gives them an opportunity to create awareness.
  • Google analytics. Google Analytics is a powerful marketing tool for organizations to use. It gives you the information needed to improve your website by providing you information about your audience to determine what channels are bringing the most traffic to your website, demographics of your audience, the bounce rate of people leaving your site, and so much more. It's a gold mine of information!
  • Community engagement. Users don’t only want to know the story behind Freedom Ride, they want to see the faces behind the story. Showing them the founders, people who volunteer, the horses, and even the people you help (if allowed) can help add to the story of Freedom Ride.

Freedom Ride Volunteer T-Shirts

Freedom Ride’s volunteers have shirts that allow their riders to distinguish the volunteers. Within the volunteers, they have a hierarchy to determine the experience, and tasks, using their new colors will allow them to be more easily distinguished.

Development

In development, we created the website using HTML, CSS, JScript, and bootstrap. Our group redesigned Freedom Ride’s website to allow the user to have easy access to information. Bringing everything we’ve worked towards come to life.

View Site.