ux project: Recruiting + PR site
The Amazon Game Services website needed a serious overhaul. It's current state mentioned a few things about working there, that Amazon was working on some future projects and that you should work here. Not much more besides unnecessary clicks to get to the job portal. The last team did a great job of putting something up fast with limited resources, but now that we had more time and headcount, it was time to hit the reset button!
After meeting with the client, we made some decisions about relevant information and hierarchy of that information. What are our primary goals? What's missing? What isn't clear but should be at the forefront? Then came the comparative analysis. After hours and hours of screen capping competitors and comparing what worked and what didn't, I was inspired to consider alternatives to initial discussions with the client. I also looked at news sites and other great portals that did a good job of not only displaying important information up front and center, but did it in a human centered way.
Surfing and surfing and surfing...
But good research isn't just about looking at your competitors, it's about talking to relevant customers. Interviews with people that might actually use the Amazon Games Website was vital. This helped narrow down our demographic as well. Our researched helped narrow requirements in phase one, as well as paint a picture of a typical persona (yes I believe in personas to some extent).
With enough information to clear a path, I started doing serious mockups, experimenting with many styles and realizing, of course, that certain features just won't be available on a small, handheld device. Hence the extensive mockups for different devices:
Lots of devices out there...so what do we have to give up on certain platforms? What's our core device?
In the end, we decided that a news feed type approach would help keep the site alive and breathing, so that when information became stagnant or outdated, it would disappear giving way to new articles. This means either more work for the team to keep news feeds up to date, but we found that algorithmically we could keep things moving by aligning with game sites as well, heralding relevant information across all game teams and porting it into the Amazon Games Website:
Here are the main pages. While I try to stick to wireframes, sometimes it's difficult for the client to picture what the final image will look like...so it was necessary to offer a little visual design as well.
In the end, we decided that a news feed type approach would help keep the site alive and breathing, so that when information became stagnant or outdated, it would disappear giving way to new articles. This means more work for the team to keep news feeds up to date, but we found that algorithmically we could keep things moving by aligning with game sites as well, heralding relevant information across all game teams and porting it into the Amazon Games Website.
Like to see the site in its current form? Check it out here: Amazon Games