FileLink is a local records storage and management company. With an increase in digital storage options, they needed a modern website to attract clients. This site gives an open, fresh look while maintaining the professionalism so critical to security-based companies.Our process began with a thorough assessment not only of FileLink’s business model, but most importantly their company values and mission. FileLink is remarkable in their field for building personal relationships with their clients, and for hands-on service and quick turnaround on requests. They often contrast themselves to their less-friendly national competitor, Iron Mountain.

The design uses this association to create clear contrast, with larger clickable areas and multiple methods of direct communication to create an inviting image. The site overall is quite simple, focusing visitor action to getting an estimate or otherwise making direct contact. All content is managed with a local installation of WordPress to ensure the client can make future changes easily.

The client handled writing copy for the new site, by request.

Thriving Church Consulting is Tom Bandy’s church growth and transformation consulting service. Because of his constant travel and preference for direct communication, ThrivingChurch.com needed to be very hands-off, primarily functioning as a reference library of useful tools, secondarily as promotion for his services.

Design

Tom loves bold, and has a small set of images which symbolically communicate his vision. He works in Word and PowerPoint most often, and needed to easily translate his work to the web. With some leading suggestions from Tom, I created a design which clearly segregates the services offerings from the resource archives. Because these archives would be so extensive, search was made prominent. The homepage features an excerpt of the most recently added content. Otherwise, I kept the design lightweight to give the volumes of text and images center stage.

Features

ThrivingChurch.com is rife with specialized coding and plugins, but they all work in the background to keep maintainence as simple as possible. The site is built on WordPress, especially for its ability to paste from Word and upload media easily. Search is enhanced, and a simple contact form lets Tom keep his communication to email. It’s search-engine optimized to help seekers find relevant articles. I also set up Google Analytics to automatically email Tom useful statistics monthly. Everything works together to give Tom the hands-off site he needs while maximizing accessibility for visitors to his volumes of resources.

Parkway is a smallish church of about 200 members situated in a middle-class residential neighborhood. Invigorated by a transformation process, and with a new pastor, Parkway needed a fresh website to illustrate its identity and life to visitors. With staff cuts, it also needed a site easy to maintain by volunteers.

Design

Parkway’s people are warm and friendly, and it has a very full calendar, as well as ties to strong ministries. It also supports a widely-recognized preschool. I drew colors from the prominent stained-glass window in the sanctuary to create a muted warm background punctuated by vivid blues and reds.

With a priority on visitors, the most prominent content is an image slideshow and short list of top visitor questions. Visitors decide quickly to stay or leave a website, so clear imagery and basic information help answer their questions quickly. Below this the homepage is devoted to activities and ministries. Each item links to more content, and subpages give links to related subjects. Those looking for information on the preschool are quickly directed via the header.

Features

The whole site is built on WordPress, which allows anyone given a password to create and edit content. Graphics, such as the header and ministry buttons, were created custom to reflect Parkway’s unique personality. It’s search-engine optimized with a custom script in the “Upcoming Events” section to hide events that have already passed. It uses Google Calendar for full activity listings and Google Maps for directions. It also has a plugin to upload mp3 files of sermons and play them directly from the website.

Full disclosure: I’m a member and former staff of Parkway Presbyterian Church, and designed the site prior to making web design my full-time job.

Parkway has since made changes to the original design on their own. I wasn’t involved in the later changes and can’t speak for them.