Redesigning Your Firm's Website

We also completely changed the way visitors can search for, or more importantly, find, the information they're looking for. Our search functionality previously employed a site-wide search. A user would type in “Smith,” and any item with that name came up in the results. Now, search results are suggested as the user types, and the results page displays a small number of the top hits for each major content category on the site, with the ability to click to view the full set of results within each category.

Clients can easily filter their search by attorney, publication or experience, and attorneys can find out if we have experience representing a plastics company in Texas, for example, instead of going back and forth on e-mail with other firm members to find this information.

Client-Centric Marketing

It was very important that Benesch's new website be inspired by the firm's dedication to building a deep understanding of its clients' businesses and industries and on providing business-minded and team-oriented solutions to legal problems. The new site allows us to present our experience through the lens of our clients. Client testimonials are now showcased directly on the homepage, assuring that our market promise is infused into the site.

New Look and Feel

We wanted to create something totally different from the typical law firm website. We wanted something that was really edgy, which is why we chose a bold design option, with a dark color palette. Using large, client-centric imagery to support our client highlights on the homepage was another bold decision, as this has only recently started to be allowed on legal websites. Finally, we opted to use a single-page homepage navigation structure, with parallax scrolling to add an element of movement to the site.

Making it Social '

Improving the organization and delivery of thought leadership and showing our audience that Benesch is knowledgeable in the topics they're interested in was a key goal of this launch. Consequently, we really wanted to incorporate more of the firm's social media and blog posts on the new site.

One North's design suggestions helped us highlight some of our social media activity on the homepage in a unique way. We now have a “What's Trending” section on the bottom of the homepage, where we can highlight up to six of our social profiles or industry blogs at a time.

' And Mobile

Shortly after the new site went live, we embarked on the mobile site project. We toyed around with whether we even wanted to do a mobile version because we thought the website design on the main site is so beautiful, but in the end, we couldn't deny the importance of providing users a touch-friendly experience as well.

The mobile version is essentially the same as our main site on the back end, but the look is totally different on the front end. We knew users coming from smartphones and tablets would have different needs in terms of the amount and types of content they're consuming, so we created a version of the site to fit those needs.

A Holistic Launch

One North really helped us to take advantage of every communication channel for this launch. Realizing that the new “What's Trending” section of the homepage would drive a lot of traffic to our social media channels, they helped us reface all of our profiles to synchronize the new look.

Our Facebook and LinkedIn pages were updated shortly before the launch with a 'sneak peek' approach, alerting followers that the launch was happening soon. Our Twitter account was also updated with imagery that matched the new color theme. It was a great way to preview the launch, get people excited about it and then drive traffic to it once it was live. In addition to refreshing our social profiles, we also created an e-mail launch announcement that went out to all firm contacts that integrated the look and feel of the new site and social media properties.

The Final Result

We may call it a redesign, but really, it's a whole new site. Everything I've heard since the launch has been positive. People have said that they love the new look, and our new site is much more user-friendly, which we were thrilled to hear. We've even had potential clients contact us through the site.

Julie Gurney is the Senior Marketing Communications Manager at Benesch. Reach her at [email protected].

My firm, Benesch, embarked on a website redesign project last year. We partnered with One North Interactive (One North) to develop and launch a vastly different, dynamic website that more effectively showcases the firm's recent growth and progressive and vibrant personality.

Improving User-Friendliness

One of the main objectives we identified was to make our most important content more easily accessible. Previously, we had a laundry list of our practice areas listed on the site. To make it easier for potential clients to learn more about our experience, we took that massive list of practice groups and broke it down into a list of focus areas and industries we serve. We also rewrote many of the practice group descriptions so that the most relevant information could be found in the first few paragraphs.

We also completely changed the way visitors can search for, or more importantly, find, the information they're looking for. Our search functionality previously employed a site-wide search. A user would type in “Smith,” and any item with that name came up in the results. Now, search results are suggested as the user types, and the results page displays a small number of the top hits for each major content category on the site, with the ability to click to view the full set of results within each category.

Clients can easily filter their search by attorney, publication or experience, and attorneys can find out if we have experience representing a plastics company in Texas, for example, instead of going back and forth on e-mail with other firm members to find this information.

Client-Centric Marketing

It was very important that Benesch's new website be inspired by the firm's dedication to building a deep understanding of its clients' businesses and industries and on providing business-minded and team-oriented solutions to legal problems. The new site allows us to present our experience through the lens of our clients. Client testimonials are now showcased directly on the homepage, assuring that our market promise is infused into the site.

New Look and Feel

We wanted to create something totally different from the typical law firm website. We wanted something that was really edgy, which is why we chose a bold design option, with a dark color palette. Using large, client-centric imagery to support our client highlights on the homepage was another bold decision, as this has only recently started to be allowed on legal websites. Finally, we opted to use a single-page homepage navigation structure, with parallax scrolling to add an element of movement to the site.

Making it Social '

Improving the organization and delivery of thought leadership and showing our audience that Benesch is knowledgeable in the topics they're interested in was a key goal of this launch. Consequently, we really wanted to incorporate more of the firm's social media and blog posts on the new site.

One North's design suggestions helped us highlight some of our social media activity on the homepage in a unique way. We now have a “What's Trending” section on the bottom of the homepage, where we can highlight up to six of our social profiles or industry blogs at a time.

' And Mobile

Shortly after the new site went live, we embarked on the mobile site project. We toyed around with whether we even wanted to do a mobile version because we thought the website design on the main site is so beautiful, but in the end, we couldn't deny the importance of providing users a touch-friendly experience as well.

The mobile version is essentially the same as our main site on the back end, but the look is totally different on the front end. We knew users coming from smartphones and tablets would have different needs in terms of the amount and types of content they're consuming, so we created a version of the site to fit those needs.

A Holistic Launch

One North really helped us to take advantage of every communication channel for this launch. Realizing that the new “What's Trending” section of the homepage would drive a lot of traffic to our social media channels, they helped us reface all of our profiles to synchronize the new look.

Our Facebook and LinkedIn pages were updated shortly before the launch with a 'sneak peek' approach, alerting followers that the launch was happening soon. Our Twitter account was also updated with imagery that matched the new color theme. It was a great way to preview the launch, get people excited about it and then drive traffic to it once it was live. In addition to refreshing our social profiles, we also created an e-mail launch announcement that went out to all firm contacts that integrated the look and feel of the new site and social media properties.

The Final Result

We may call it a redesign, but really, it's a whole new site. Everything I've heard since the launch has been positive. People have said that they love the new look, and our new site is much more user-friendly, which we were thrilled to hear. We've even had potential clients contact us through the site.

Julie Gurney is the Senior Marketing Communications Manager at Benesch. Reach her at [email protected].