The Client
ThinkSMART Oklahoma is a state initiative by the Community Action Network to bring attention to the state's opioid crisis. The site's goal is to provide information to medical professionals and the public on the dangers of prescription drug addiction; and to make a difference by having the public engage with their lawmakers to push through change.
The Challenge
The biggest challenge of designing the site was its timeline. ThinkSmartOK.org needed to be planned, designed, coded and launched in 15 business days. The vacation schedules and other deadlines of my department meant this project was entirely my responsibility.
The Planning
The initial request for the project was a one-pager. After looking over the information provided by the client, I quickly realized this was much more than a one-page website. I took a day of the timeline to research other addiction and recovery websites and found most of them are clinical and stale. After spending another day familiarizing myself with the written content provided by the client, I saw a pattern. After ten minutes with a co-worker and a whiteboard that pattern was sketched out, creating a path to begin designing/coding.
The Design
With the quick turnaround on this project there was very little Photoshop work. The pages of the site were sketched then translated directly into code. After getting the page templates coded, I created a color palette based on the logo, and chose fonts for the project with a quick letterform study combining typefaces and choosing complimentary fonts with ease of read.
The information from the client was so text heavy I decided to seek out more visual representations of their content. With little time to wait on additional information I used the copy provided to locate government studies and graphics for implementation into the site to make it less boring.
The site was approved two days before launch. I spent those last today days improving efficiencies by refactoring the CSS and optimizing image files. During this time, I also set up hosting for the project, as well as creating website analytics. Ensuring the future hand off to the client would be smooth and successful.
The Result
In the end, and in large part due to my attention to detail, my client and project management skills and my drive to seek out additional content, the annual contract and grant was extended to its full five years for $5 million. The project launched so flawlessly and exceeded such expectations that months after the website was launched, when meeting the clients in person for the first time, the main organizer asked if he could hug me!
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