I’m pretty geeked today. We’re launching www.farmbureauinsuranceracing.com, the website created for MadGENIUS client, Farm Bureau Insurance, to hilight their sponsorship of one of NASCAR’s premier teams.
I’m very pleased that the interactive design, development and deployment processes I have created and implemented at MadGENIUS have produced excellent results. As a team we had some good cooperation across internal teams – account handling, design, copywriting, content development and the area get my feet wet in, information architecture and front-end code creation/integration. We started this project by surveying other team sites – amp, jack daniels, bud-light, home-depot, etc. Rather than creating some uber bandwidth intensive flash site, I urged we go with a clean, bandwidth friendly xhtml/css core and then sprinkled in interactive widgets, video players and social networking features.
From an IA and UX perspective, I created a series of intuitive tabbed interfaces for the global and section navigation. The tabs are large, well labeled, and provide site visitors with an easy means of navigating throughout the breadth of the site. We also have implemented some JavaScript and Flash based widgets to more effectively utilize screen real estate on the home page. One additional aspect is the inclusion of distinct level 2 landing pages for each major content section and an additional template layout for each level 3 and level 4 page. The result is a visual indication of where one is within the site from a depth and granularity perspective.
Creatively, we started with the ‘Get Real’ look we developed for the public life insurance site (still in development). This yielded what I feel is a modern, sleek, masculine look and feel that marries quite well with the NASCAR experience. We created a new logo and graphical style that we carried through to each and every page. One of the hallmarks of the site in my opinion and something that may garner some decent traffic is the inclusion of a series of custom webisodes shot on location at Joe Gibbs Racing headquarters in Hendersonville, NC. Our very own Danny Dauphin, copywriter and actor extrordinairre morphed into a Dirty Jobs type character in his bid to make the Joe Gibbs Racing pit crew. We will be releasing the eight webisodes periodically throughout the season.
From a code perspective, as stated, I started off with a super-clean xhtml/css foundation. I used the 960.gs css framework for all layout and separate stylesheets to reset all browsers – then included separate stylesheets for overall design, widgets (not used on all pages), table styles, and forms. JavaScript is included only on those pages that require the magic. I integrated a customized version of WordPress for news publishing and the search engine benefits blogs tend to provide, the opensource zenphoto for the photo galleries section, and we link out the a third-party list/newsletter system (mailchimp) for our CRM needs.
Many hours went into this site – the client is overjoyed with our attention to detail. I am happy with the outcome and really look forward to gathering some stats on usage and learning where we can augment and improve things in my bid to provide a first-class online experience for the fans.
Thoughts? Comments? Leave ‘em below and I’ll make sure the project leader gets his eyes on ‘em.
Rob lives and works in the town of Jackson, MS where he leads the interactive department at an awesome advertising and branding agency. Life is slower than most places in Mississippi, and Rob tends to like it that way. Some of his favorite life experiences include sailing across the Atlantic Ocean in a 44ft sloop, learning to speak Swahili while living along the lower slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro, and zipping along the curviest of Mississippi country roads in his VW Rabbit.