Case Study - Wayside Kitchens Website Redesign
A common problem I’ve seen across a few clients has been overpriced agencies that provide a lack of control for the business owner when it comes to website management. This was the pain point that I faced with this project. I fully believe that every business owner should have full control over their website. Yes, of course I believe they should also hire a web designer to help them, but there should never be a moment when the owner of the business can’t go on the site and upload pictures or change pricing by themselves. There are many agencies that manage sites for business owners, and that is wonderful if they’re doing a good job and being responsive when it comes to changes, but when it takes weeks or months for a small change to be made or for the business owner to get an email reply from their agency, it’s time to find a new web designer.
Here are the issues that drove this redesign:
Photos were from over a decade ago and new projects had not been uploaded since 2014.
There was no way to make larger changes from the Wordpress account that Wayside Kitchens had access to. They could change text, but most of the changes required code and the agency had locked them out of making any fundamental changes.
Again, that’s fine if the site is working, but it had been the same for 10+ years and wasn’t able to evolve with technology.
In order to meet accessibility standards, the agency had encouraged Wayside Kitchens to pay for a plugin that would give users accessibility widgets (screen reader, dyslexia font, contrast changes, etc.), while not actually perfecting the usability or accessibility of the site itself.
The agency had also taken the domain name, which was registered at Wix, and re-registered it on Namecheap, without notifying Wayside Kitchens or providing a login. While this probably made life easier for the agency to manage the site, they should have been transparent about it.
While one of my goals was to redesign the site, my priority is always to troubleshoot problems and save my client time and money. So here’s what I did:
Created a new Wix site with an intuitive, user-friendly design, and clear Call-To-Action buttons to make it easy for potential clients to get in touch.
Uploaded new photos and created a portfolio page where it was easy for new projects to be uploaded by Wayside Kitchens without a developer.
Added myself as a site collaborator, leaving Wayside Kitchens as the owner of the site so that they can make changes as needed.
Checked accessibility standards using Wix’s built-in accessibility tools. Added alt-text, contrast, correct header hierarchy, and did a manual scan of the site’s usability with a checklist of the legal requirements for ADA compliance so that paying for the accessibility plug in would no longer be necessary.
Found the WhoIs data on where the domain was registered, had Wayside Kitchens obtain account information, and transferred the domain back to Wix so that everything is registered in one place.
