Simplified user-friendly website for SEPMA with a sleek new mobile-first design

The Southeast PA Manufacturing Alliance (SEPMA) is a multi-employer collaborative, consisting of regional manufacturers, industry educators, workforce developers, economic developers, and community organizers, all in alliance to address workforce needs in the manufacturing sector.

The problem

SEPMA wanted a microsite hosted on the larger Philadelphia Works website. Their overall goal was to successfully grow membership by clearly conveying their value to members and prospective members as well as providing a platform to share industry news and events.

Their old website was outdated and had an unclear site structure. They needed a clean and fresh design that guided users to where to go. They also needed to convince key stakeholders of the value of membership. 

The solutions

Key Medium created a custom website design, focusing on underlying development, foundations, and site structure. We focused on on-page and off-page SEO as well as branding, development, and content strategy for lead generation.

Overall, the website had to be user-friendly and create a seamless experience for the HR/training managers and an executive audience. We implemented a cohesive color scheme, improved branding design, and created a user experience that makes sense.

From the homepage, the branding message is clear: “leading a new age in manufacturing.” Next, the industry partnership is broken down into a graphic, a definition, and a CTA button to find out more about the company. Finally, the page invites the user to look at upcoming events, the latest news, or explore the site further. The user is guided through its actions. The footer invites the users, again, to find out more about SEPMA, take a look at careers, workforce services, learning and innovation, the newsroom, or social media links.

If a user decided to use the menu, they could find information ‘About SEPMA’, ‘Partners’, ‘Affiliates’, ‘Manufacturing Events’, ‘Membership’, and ‘News’. On each page, the next steps for the user are presented in a clear way. For example, on the ‘About’ page, users can find out about SEPMA, look at various reports, the executive board, those who fund projects or return to menu options. The site’s new structure allows users to know exactly where they can and want to navigate next with clear titles, headings, and a clear layout. 

During development, we created a microsite with a quick turnaround launch so that the site could immediately improve without interruptions in service. We restructured the SEO of existing content to ensure the website will perform well for years to come.

The results

The overall look and feel of the website were vastly improved. We had the following results.

• Increased membership by over 7%
• Increased total page views by over 20%
• Lifted unique pageviews by over 75%
• Reduced bounce rate by nearly 15%

Awards

SEPMA received a 2019 Muse Creative Awards Rose Gold and a 2019 dotComm Awards Honorable Mention in Web-Associations. The Muse awards recognize excellence in design, creativity, and digital and the dotComm awards recognize web creativity.

Do you want impressive results? Is your user experience suffering? Is your website confusing? You may need a  Design Strategy and User Experience overhaul. Get in touch with Key Medium today.