The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee
The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee is dedicated to the care and well-being of retired elephants from around the world. It relies heavily on grants and donations to run its operations.
- Product management
- Web design
- Development
Objective
Create a modern, responsive website that uses the Sanctuary’s photography and animals to promote its mission and drive donations and subscriptions.
Process
Research and challenges
Research came from conversations with the Sanctuary’s staff and from the previous site’s analytics, which showed where visitors struggled. That data shaped many of the user flows and features on the new site.
The project took patience: many stakeholders reviewed and requested updates. With that many voices, conflicting ideas have to be managed toward the best outcome for everyone. We navigated it well, and the client was happy with both the process and the result.
Design and development
After the research, and after updating the style guide from the old site, we presented several homepage designs to find the feel the client wanted to portray.
From there we worked through each page, getting approval on every design before building the responsive front end. This also let the client review and update content as the designs progressed.
Results and impact
Since launch, the Sanctuary has seen an increase in donations and in sales from its online store. Time on site is up as people go deeper to learn about the Sanctuary and its residents, and traffic has grown to the most popular page, the EleCam, where visitors watch live cameras of the elephants in their habitat.
Client feedback on the process and the final design was overwhelmingly positive, and they have been happy with the site’s continued analytics.