Ellingham Hall: How Changing the Structure of a Website Can Improve Its User Experience

Ellingham Hall is a luxury wedding venue and its business has expanded hugely over the past few years. As is expected, to accommodate this growth their site has been added to and altered at various stages over this period. When the time came for us here at Blumilk to reorganise and redesign parts of their site, we recognised it as an opportunity to improve their user experience (UX).

Here’s why it’s important to provide a positive user experience and how we applied this understanding to Ellingham Hall’s website redesign!

Providing a Positive User Experience: The Supermarket Analogy

For most businesses, customer satisfaction is an absolute top priority as this factor often determines the likelihood of a person making a purchase, inquiry, referral, or return. Due to the many digital developments over recent decades, this requirement to satisfy customers’ needs and intentions has slowly but surely crept into online – as well as physical – spaces.

Supermarkets are often used as an analogy for search engine optimisation, website redesigns, and UX. Whilst we might not think about it when we go, supermarkets are very carefully planned in various ways. For example:

• Isles are laid out specifically to influence the route made by shoppers e.g. having checkoutsspanning the width of the storeto make it as easy as possible to pay
• Isles are clearly labelled and follow an intuitive order/hierarchy
• Products are labelled andplaced in specific ways to encourage greater attention to certain products e.g. ‘grabbable’ items are placed at the entrance and by checkouts to encourage impulse purchases
• The warehouse section is always out of site of users, similar to the ‘back-end’ or ‘off-page’ elements of a website
• Cold/freezer sections are often grouped together for greater efficiency, just as navigation bars use groupings

Websites can be considered as much a ‘space’ as anything else in the physical world because they also require planning, navigation, and maintenance. Over time, pages will be added and removed, links will be changed, content will be altered, images will be uploaded and deleted, links will be added, and so on. If this isn’t regularly reviewed, this can start to damage what’s termed the UX.

The Ellingham Hall Site: What Was Needed?

When Ellingham Hall approached us to redesign their website we were excited at the opportunity and challenge ahead, recognising it as a great opportunity to improve their UX.

Getting started, we devised some specific objectives to help us accomplish this aim, which were to:

• Make it easier for Ellingham Hall to update and upload changes to the site
• Make their navigation function more consistent across the site’s pages
• Alter the templates used on some pages to make the site more mobile friendly
• Make Ellingham Hall’s popular gallery page more search friendly
• Create and implement consistent call to action buttons on necessary pages

In theory, these changes would improve the site’s UX by reintroducing consistency to the site and making it more seamless and intuitive to use. These changes would also give Ellingham Hall more influence over the user journey, allowing them to encourage users along predetermined or favourable routes.

The Ellingham Hall Site: What Did We Do?

This was a particularly interesting project as it was very varied, involving multiple specific parts of the site.

We started by reviewing the current sitemap and proposing a more effective version which used our custom templates in a more consistent way across the site’s various pages. We then changed the layout of these pages to incorporate more content and to showcase the amazing photography of the venue, which is a key driving point for the site.

Once this was done, our talented developer created a bespoke search and filter system for their gallery page. This means that people can easily search for their wedding photos within the large gallery without wasting time.

Then we turned to the buying journey and thought about how we could use buttons to streamline the buying journey. We added a consistent ‘Book a Private Viewing’ button to the top right of the screen so that users can get to this crucial step regardless of where they are on the site. We also included an expandable ‘Contact Us’ and ‘Private Viewing’ button for both desktop and mobile versions of the site.

These changes may seem subtle but in unison they contribute to a seamless, improved UX. Importantly, Ellingham Hall will reap the benefits of this redesign for years to come as the results will be cumulative over time.

Here at Blumilk, we’re always looking to tackle problems preemptively and for ways to exceed our clients’ expectations. Regardless of the size or type of business or project, we will always find effective business solutions to help propel your business operations. Don’t hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions, from graphic design to digital marketing and from brand development to advertising campaigns!

Marketing and Communications: We Are Better Together

Here at Blumilk, our central aim is to better connect our clients to their customers and audiences via effective marketing and communication services. We know we’re doing our job right when our clients are expanding their customer base, being chosen for awards, and establishing their authority within their sector or field.

It can be daunting for companies large and small to choose an agency to deliver a project, strategy, or campaign. It takes time from both sides to find the most effective fit and to develop a working relationship so that we can better understand a client’s needs and requirements.

Here at Blumilk, we have 20 years experience providing marketing and communication services for clients across multiple sectors on both a regional (e.g. Northern Power Grid and Alnwick Gardens) and a national level (e.g. various NHS trusts and CCW). Here are some examples of what we have recently produced:

Central to this track record is that we have a very collaborative approach for all our projects and campaigns, preferring to create a collaborative bond with our clients, rather than simply consulting them. We do this by taking the time to get fully understand their business needs, challenges, and opportunities from conception to completion, and have found that this yields the best results.

We would like to take this opportunity to welcome all our new clients (you know who you are!) and to acknowledge and appreciate our existing clients who we have been constantly building a long-lasting relationship with. We are proud of the work we produce and we are more excited than ever to see what the future holds, and to see how we can find gaps to evolve and innovate.

Would your business benefit from creative and digital business solutions to help you better grasp your opportunities? Don’t hesitate to drop us an email or get in touch with us here to find out more about how we will help you excel!

Blumilk Branding Agency Moves to Central Newcastle

In 1999, Blumilk was conceived in a small creative office on Pink Lane by brothers Colin and Adam Robinson. 23 years later, and with a reputation as an innovative northeast branding agency, we are proud and excited to move to Grey Street in the heart of the toon rather than being pestered by seagulls along the Ouseburn!

Whilst moving can be particularly stressful, it is usually for the better. When we decided to move from our fabulous office space in the Ouseburn and into the city centre in the autumn of last year, we knew it would be worth it in the long run – for our clients as much as our staff.

So far, Grey Street has definitely lived up to our expectations! With one of the most desirable postcodes in the northeast and a new spacious office to match this, it comes with more suitable areas for client meetings now that we are moving away from social distancing and home-working.

The new location will also ensure a better work life for our team who 100% deserve it after the past couple of years. Not only is Grey Street better suited to flexible office working and regional commuting, but it is also more involved in the city centre with a bigger range of options for lunch and socialising!

Ultimately, as a leading branding agency, it is important to us that where we work reflects the work we do. The new Grey Street office is packed with modern touches and dynamic meeting spaces, and we have an ambitious and hardworking team to make the most of it.

If you have any upcoming campaigns or projects that you think would benefit from our digital and creative experts, then don’t hesitate to get in touch to arrange a visit to our new home at 60 Grey Street.