At Educated Path, my client Cindy helps prospective students choose the right program by comparing post-secondary programs in an easy-to-use chart. Cindy helps her clients to dream beyond the school their sister, cousin, or parents went to. One way she helps her clients is through her Educated Path Reports that help her clients choose the best place to pursue their educational goals. Her aim is for her clients to enjoy their degree, to follow-through and graduate feeling like they made the right choice. Now that’s a unique value proposition!
Cindy was a referral from one of my favourite small business entrepreneurs, Strategic Charm Boutique. Cindy had tried creating her website on her own first, but struggled to get her ideas into paragraphs and pages. As soon as I got off our first Dream Session, I texted the owner of Strategic Charm Boutique, Charmaine and thanked her for sending me the ideal-est of ideal clients. I shared that I felt like I should be paying Cindy to work with her, not the other way around!
What made me so excited to work with Cindy? Well, many things, one of them being that she has a well-defined niche, and an amazing offer idea. She was very clear about how she creates her client transformation, which made its way onto the website on her Services page and her product descriptions.
Cindy’s brand was designed to be educational and professional, but not stuffy. We co-created her brand with a fun colour palette and eye-catching fonts. We created a colourful main logo around the concept of a paper airplane on a windy, but clear trajectory to evoke the educational path her students envision for themselves. Each of the alternates features this same brand element of the paper airplane for continuity.
Using Canva, I created custom first section designs on all pages with an airy, modern feel for cohesiveness. The frame around the image gives the first image on each page a pop of colour and the fun colour-block design ties the navigation bar to the rest of the page.
The statistics were important to Cindy because they help make her ideal clients think about the educational decisions they are about to make. Although statistics can be presented on other websites in a boring way, since Cindy’s target demographic is young people, the statistics section is modern and fun instead. On the homepage, we added a custom section with a background photo for her statistics to live in. It creates a stress-free, easy-on-the-eyes user experience that is thought-provoking and helps draw the viewer’s eye to the call to action.
As we designed the site during the quarantine, Cindy wasn’t able to hire a brand photographer. I helped guide Cindy and her husband to take their own brand photos to use across the website. For all other photos on the site, we used stock photography with a focus on diversity to show that Cindy works with students from diverse backgrounds. Since the brand colours tend towards the more feminine but Cindy works with people of any gender, the stock photos chosen feature a variety of students.
On the About page we designed a refreshing fun section, Cindy’s YearBook, to tie into the educational theme and connect with her prospective clients, many of whom have just graduated high school and would have received a yearbook of their own recently. Video is a great strategy for websites because we have a visual culture of people who are accustomed to viewing video content daily, it can be easier to understand than text, and it encourages website viewers to stay on webpages longer which improves analytics and increases the likelihood of conversion (clients making purchases!). To help her clients make the right decision, Cindy wanted to share a short informational video of the report that her clients will be receiving. On the Services page, we created a section for the video that speaks directly to her clients and shows them how she helps them make an educated decision.
The Educated Path website is light, fun and modern - it was a joy to design this Squarespace website with Cindy.
“Thank you Clear Quartz Creative for all your help and creating a wonderful website!” -Cindy
Do you have a well-defined niche and want to transform how your business connects with your potential clients? Let’s chat! Connect with me on Instagram!
