BW Travel Zone

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Following a significant rebrand in 2016, Best Western set out to redefine its decade-old lifestyle travel blog, grappling with limitations imposed by cumbersome plugins and a rigid page structure that hindered user experience.

Enter Travel Zone, a modern and comprehensive content hub designed to resonate with today's savvy travelers and reposition the brand as a trailblazer in the digital realm and the travel industry at large.

Project completed as a full-time employee at Ideas Collide. To comply with the non-disclosure agreement, confidential information has been omitted from this case study. Portfolio display permission can be revoked at any time if the agency or client deems necessary.

YEAR
2018 - 2019

ROLE
Senior Designer

METHOD
UI, UX, Web Design, Prototyping, QA

TOOLS
Adobe XD, Illustrator, Photoshop

DELIVERABLE
Website Redesign

Revitalizing Wanderlust

CHALLENGE

Decade-Long Challenges

The former travel blog showcased numerous improvement opportunities that the new Travel Zone aimed to address. While it functioned as a hub for customers to engage with travel tips, photos, quizzes, recipes, and embedded videos, the blog faced challenges in terms of user experience, design, and programming. Over the past decade, accumulated issues made content challenging to locate, comprehend, and navigate.

  • Header navigation shifts after scrolling

  • Non-clickable images and text links require icon selection on hover

  • Photos inconsistently cropped due to plugins

Usability Issues

  • Lack of ADA compliance in text and button sizes, color contrast, and type hierarchy

  • Absence of filters/categories for blog content

  • Clicking a contributor bio opens a new window/page

  • Inconsistent use of three or more font families not aligned with the brand

  • Monotonous page layouts for text-heavy content

  • Need for improved sharing/social media integration

  • A cumbersome sidebar is often ignored

SOLUTION

From Blog Hurdles to Travel Zone Triumph

In dissecting the challenges faced by the travel blog, we conducted a thorough competitor analysis, benchmarking it against peers in the travel industry and rival content platforms. Collaborating with a dynamic team, including a creative director and copywriter, we pinpointed crucial improvements for the envisioned content hub. These enhancements not only effectively addressed user experience issues but also laid the foundation for enhanced scalability, ensuring a robust and adaptable platform.

Today’s BW
Clean, digestible, and accessible page design layout with defined page and type hierarchy. Also used brand approved web fonts and colors aimed to achieve a WCAG 2.1 AA level of ADA compliance across all devices.

Travel Experts
Seamless integration of social media platforms and featured social content for users who want to share travel inspiration, travel expert advice, and promotional material before planning a trip. Also created a cohesive set of ui elements and a detailed style guide.

Travel Inspiration
Increased the number of aspirational visuals, user-generated content, photo galleries, and videos to appeal the more than 30 million loyalty program members and new travelers unfamiliar with the brand. Implemented Search and Filter functionality to aid users in finding relevant content quickly.

IMPACT

Achievements

After eight months post-launch, Travel Zone significantly outperformed its predecessor, attributed to robust social media integration, enhanced search and filter functionality, and a revitalized design. Bolstered by a three-month social media campaign, the site achieved notable engagement metrics, amassing 4.4K total interactions encompassing likes, comments, and shares on Facebook and Instagram, as well as replies and retweets on Twitter.

835%

Increase in traffic from social media channels

281%

Increase in homepage views since the new site launched.

+45%

Increase in page views from former blog to Travel Zone.