Empowering Writers

Grounded in user research, shaped by brand identity—designed to stand out.

How do you take a website overflowing with information and make it feel effortless to navigate? That was the challenge at the heart of this project. By distilling complex content into clear pathways and ensuring resources were easy to search and access, I created a site educators can rely on—without needing to call on the EW team for help.

Background

Project Type:

Mobile-First Responsive Website

Role:

Product Design, UX/UI Design, Research, User Flows, Prototyping, Testing

Timeline:

8 weeks

Tools:

Figma, FigJam, Figma Slides, Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Slides, Zoom, Calendly

Empowering Writers had the resources teachers needed—but they were not always accessible. Educators often found themselves lost in the site, spending too much time searching or turning to sales staff for help instead. This not only frustrated teachers, but also pulled salespeople away from higher-level support tasks. The challenge was clear: reorganize and redesign the site so that finding answers felt effortless, efficient, and seamless.

The Problem:

Before vs. After

Research

To better understand the ELA professional development market, I analyzed four competitors: CKLA Amplify, Heggerty, Wonders, and Step Up to Writing.

A key finding is that most programs do not focus exclusively on writing. Instead, they pair writing with reading, often treating it as secondary. Empowering Writers stands out by making writing the core of its approach, while also leveraging writing strategies to strengthen reading skills—a unique differentiator in the market.

Accessibility was another area of concern for some competitors. For example, CKLA’s website is well organized with effective white space and visuals, but its supporting text uses low-contrast colors that reduce readability. Heggerty’s site includes rapidly flashing animations without user controls. While the speed slows over time, the fast-changing color blocks could be distressing for users sensitive to flashing visuals, including those at risk of seizures.

Competitive Analysis

User Interviews

I interviewed nine educators over Zoom. Each fit into one of three categories:

  • Educators who were familiar with Empowering Writers

  • Educators who were not familiar with Empowering Writers

  • Empowering Writers team members

For users unfamiliar with Empowering Writers, I focused my interviews around ascertaining what they understood about the company based solely on the website as well as their first impressions of the company and its offerings based on a quick interaction with the site’s pages.

For Empowering Writers team members, who interacted with the website often, I focused on discovering their pain points and how their clients experience the website.

For users familiar with Empowering Writers, I focused my interviews on their experience using the site to purchase products from the company; the pain points they experienced as well as how the company compares to others the educator has used in the past (if any).

Then I sorted all of the information they gave me into this affinity map:

Key Research Findings

89% of users discussed or demonstrated confusion in regard to the organization of the site.  Many were unable to find specific pages they were actively searching for.

  1. For example, multiple users could not locate the Student Samples page.

  2. Several users missed the Store, due to its placement below the navigation bar

67% of users described problems with the flow of information on the workshops page.

80% said they did not interact with the Workshops page at all.
Most preferred to contact Empowering Writers team members directly rather than trying to figure out workshop details through the site.

Teachers not familiar with the site did not know what the Literacy Launch was; a descriptive sentence for each workshop would be helpful.

67% of users found the Store difficult to find or navigate.

56% of users felt that page titles and button labels did not accurately reflect what they led to.

  1. For example, users looking for data to support EW’s success had to click a button labeled “Our Partners,” which did not clearly signal the presence of data.

I created two personas using the information I gleaned from user interviews to ensure that I would continue to empathize with and design for my users throughout the design process.

Personas:

  • Evie

    THE EARNEST EDUCATOR

    Evie has been teaching 5th grade for six years. Although she loves working with her students, she was never formally trained in how to teach writing. She’s been piecing together her lessons based on state standards and intuition, but she knows her school would benefit from stronger, more consistent writing instruction methods.

    PAIN POINTS

    –Evie has trouble remembering where to find resources on the site

    –She can’t figure out which workshop would be best for her next professional development

    –She can’t find the informational writing folders she ordered last year in the store.

  • Simone Shaw

    THE SOCIABLE SALESWOMAN

    Simone is a knowledgeable sales rep at Empowering Writers who uses the website daily to guide customers. She shares links and answers a wide range of questions, both routine and complex. She needs to quickly find and share the right resources to support customers effectively.

    PAIN POINTS

    -Simone knows that research and coaching should be highlighted more on the site, to show customers all that the company truly has to offer.

    –Her customers are confused by the workshops page and the store.

    –She lacks knowledge about ELA and the site explanations don’t always clarify resources enough help her recommend the right aids to teachers with questions.

Define User Problems

  • Site Organization

    Users encountered difficulty finding information such as prices for coaching, student sample PDFs, and items in the store. The company had many useful resources for educators- it was a matter of getting them into the educator’s hands with ease.

  • Explanation

    The site spoke to its users as if they were already familiar with Empowering Writers terminology. It did not explain things such as “Student Content”- is it BY students or FOR students?– or describe the difference between “Comprehensive Teacher Resources” and the “Teacher’s Toolbox.” Providing users with context would greatly improve usability.

Defining the MVP

Home Page

Workshops Page

The Store

I focused on the Home, Workshops, and Store pages—addressing misalignments such as users bypassing the workshop scheduling tool—so the redesign could directly improve usability while supporting the company’s top sales priorities.

Prioritize

I then prioritized my list of product features based on what would alleviate the most user pain, taking into account the amount of effort it would likely take to design these things, and came up with 5 “Must Have” Features for my product.

  1. Updated Information Architecture

With improved organization, Evie will be able to access all of the content she needs to teach effectively, and Simone will have more time to address specific client needs now that she’s receiving fewer emails about how to find things on the website.

2. Home Page

With a redesigned homepage, Evie will be able to see all that Empowering Writers has to offer and Simone will be able to showcase her products to customers much more easily. 

3. Professional Development Pages

With the Workshop schedule clearly laid out and the order in which teachers should take them explained, Evie will no longer have to contact Simone to find the next workshop near her. Now she can schedule it for herself.

4. Store

With a more organized and searchable store, Evie will be able to locate items she’s purchased in the past with ease, and Simone will easily recommend resources to new clients using the website’s new filtering system.

5. A Search Function

With all this content on the site, users need a quick and easy place to access what they want. The search bar did not appear on the mobile version of the app, so I’m going to ensure that Evie and Simone can search for what they need quickly no matter what device they’re using.

User Flows

I began by mapping the flows from the user’s perspective—considering how they would navigate the site, what obstacles they might face, and what alternate goals they might pursue.

Sign Up for a Workshop

For the workshop flow, I considered how users ideally search—prioritizing location, since research showed a preference for in-person workshops—and how they might respond if none were available nearby. I accounted for this possibility in my designs.

Buy an Item in the Store

Building on the site’s existing store categories, I restructured the information to help users locate items more quickly. The original design only allowed filtering by a single trait—for example, selecting Grade 4 resources without the ability to narrow further by location or resource type. To address this, I designed a system that supports multi-trait filtering, enabling users to refine searches with precision while still offering flexibility for those who prefer not to use the search bar.

Store Quiz

In interviews, a team member shared that many educators struggle to identify what they need from the store. To solve this, I proposed an interactive quiz to guide users toward the most relevant resources. Although the feature was cut due to time constraints, I adapted the concept and integrated its core ideas into the store’s filtration system—ensuring users could still find tailored results efficiently.

Organization Step 1: Sitemap

The most important area to focus on was information architecture. I created a new sitemap that emphasized what Empowering Writers has to offer (for people who are unfamiliar with the product) and organized resources based on what they could do for the user and how they would be utilized. 

Design

Learning from past projects—where I initially mapped only the most significant screens—I began this time by sketching low-fidelity wireframes for every mobile screen before moving into mid-fidelity designs in Figma.

Mobile Version

In the original mid-fidelity version of the mobile site, I experimented with multiple different layouts to order the information consistently and efficiently.

You’ll notice on the third screen (workshops) that the Upcoming Workshop cards have both a vertical and a horizontal layout.

On the homepage I had combined Workshops and Coaching under one heading “Professional Development” for clarity, but users indicated they wanted separate sections with images for each type of PD.

The grade buttons in the store were initially quite large in the design, taking up a good portion of the screen so this was later refined.

Mid-Fidelity Wireframes

Once the basic structure was in place, I transitioned into mid-fidelity wireframes to refine the ideas and identify issues that hadn’t surfaced in the low-fidelity phase— since those early sketches lacked real content and copy.

User research revealed that most people preferred using the site on desktop rather than mobile. In response, I began shifting the primary layouts from mobile to desktop while still updating key mobile screens to maintain responsiveness.

At the start of the mid-fidelity phase, I focused on carrying forward user-friendly elements from the mobile version while refining layouts for clarity. For example, I preserved the dropdown that explains the recommended workshop sequence—helpful for new users—but kept it minimized so it wouldn’t distract those who already know what they’re looking for. On the Workshop Pricing page, I consolidated the extensive payment details under a “payment options” button to reduce visual clutter and make the page easier to scan.

Mid-Fidelity Testing

Several aspects of the initial design evolved during this stage to better support users.

The home page originally featured a visually busy grid of company logos to showcase Empowering Writers’ reach, but this was simplified into an infinite logo loop on the home page for clarity.

The workshop flow assumed that teachers paid for their own workshops (as the current site implied), but user feedback highlighted the need to adjust this to reflect schools and districts often making purchases.

In the store, filters were initially split across two pages—first grade level, then subject matter and language—but I recognized this added friction and moved toward a more streamlined, flexible filtering system.

Since many educators aren’t always sure which resources will best meet their needs, the EW team wanted to make it easier for them to connect with a salesperson for tailored guidance. To support this, I added a clear CTA in the hero section, encouraging users to reach out for personalized support.

Branding

With the structure locked in, it was time to give the designs some personality. Empowering Writers already had a strong visual identity—bright, confident colors that spoke to both education and empowerment. But the site needed more than just color; it needed a look that felt uniquely theirs. I brought in the flowy, organic shapes from their promotional materials to soften the layout and add movement. The result was a design that felt true to their brand while standing apart from the boxy, rigid feel of many competitor sites.

Before

After 

High-Fidelity Prototype

Below is a quick scroll-through of the home page. Click the button to see the full prototype.

User Prototype Testing

I tested the high-fidelity prototype with five users over Zoom. I had Zoom users share their screen with me and click through my prototype while articulating their thoughts to get as many insights as possible.

Iterations

Overall this round of testing went very well. There were only two major updates I needed to make after testing:

  • Users overlooked the “don’t see your location? Contact us.” message. So I had to find a way to make sure they couldn’t miss it. I solved this problem by adding an “other” option to the location filter. When someone clicks it, a pop up message will appear which tells users to contact the team to see if they can get a workshop in their location.

  • Some users were still confused about the workshop sequence since the order wasn’t completely linear. To solve this, I redesigned the dropdown explanation to make the progression crystal clear. After confirming the details with two EW team members, I transformed the information into a clean, easy-to-read infographic in Figma—turning a point of confusion into a quick visual guide.

I also introduced smaller refinements, like adding hover states to the store page flags so their meaning was instantly clear, and replacing the vague “add item” button with a familiar quantity dropdown next to “add to cart” for a smoother shopping experience.

Final Version:

Outcome and Next Steps

The results of these changes were immediate and encouraging. Every user who tested the new design agreed the site felt more intuitive and far easier to navigate. EW team members also praised the redesign, even sharing it with colleagues—clear validation that the updates made both a functional and professional impact.

While I was able to redesign the MVP, the next step would be extending these structural and design improvements across the entire site for consistency and clarity. My immediate priority would be the Coaching page—the third major offering from EW—followed by a deeper dive into the HUB free trial experience.

One EW team member mentioned that while many teachers sign up for the 7-day free trial, few convert to paying customers. Since educators I interviewed spoke highly of the HUB itself, this suggests the issue lies in how the trial is set up or presented. Investigating and redesigning that flow could have a significant impact on conversions and would be a natural next focus.

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