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https://afrotech.com/

AfroTech Design Case Study

Brand Identity
Experience design
Visual Language
creative direction
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A media and events company that focuses on promoting and highlighting the achievements of Black innovators, entrepreneurs, and technologists.

A blank woman on a conference of Afrotech.
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About
the project

Challenge:

The gap between white and black individuals has often resulted in the latter being overlooked, especially in the IT sector. The founder of AfroTech set out to tackle this issue by shining a light on black innovators and fostering a supportive community.

To achieve this goal, the AfroTech website was created—a news platform featuring regularly updated content focused on black individuals in IT, business, education, and beyond.

However, as time went on, the website became outdated and failed to effectively serve its purpose. That's when the client turned to Lazarev to refresh the site, better align it with the brand and its services and more importantly — improve retention rate.

Approach:

We started the project aiming for a website that stands out with its vibrant, clear, and prominent design, different from usual news sites. Our focus was on increasing engagement and improving AfroTech online presence to make people return to the site again and again.

20,000

AfroTech went from 500 people in 2017 to 20,000 people in 2022, this increase shows the interest & impact of AfroTech.

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5

AfroTech has expanded its reach by establishing five sub-brands, some of which we have collaborated with.

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x2

The initial scope soared twofold shouldering the extra tasks we embraced.

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Marlena Stablein
Director of Operations, Blavity

We saw an increase in engagement metrics, in users and in resume submissions.

Marlena Stablein Photo
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The Project’s
Discovery Phase

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Creating a Video-First Site

In our endeavor to enhance user engagement and retention metrics, we have adopted a video-first strategy. The objective was to create an atmosphere similar to that of a lively media hub, breaking free from the usual constraints of a news-focused platform.

In addition to promoting the Afro community, the website aimed to showcase AfroTech events, job opportunities and  promotional offers of the client's subsidiary projects. So, we intentionally placed CTA banners guiding people to explore valuable AfroTech offers.

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Forming Community & Improving Retention

A pivotal strategy in achieving higher retention rates was to encourage newsletter subscriptions. Thus, we proposed placing a "Subscribe" call-to-action directly below the initial screen and within the navigation menu.

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Adding Dynamics for User Engagement

Our design solutions go beyond the usual layouts found on similar sites within the niche. We introduced a dynamic grid to enhance interactivity.

To capture the bold spirit of AfroTech and its audacious values, we opted for large fonts, images, and extended video blocks.  Adding a touch of humanity and vibrancy, we featured photos showcasing smiling faces.

These solutions contribute to creating a memorable user experience, which is a core aspect of digital brand activation.

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Incorporating Revenue-Generating Components

Ad placement stands as one of AfroTech's primary revenue streams. Our UX challenge lay in designing an interface that balances user-friendliness without overwhelming readers with advertisements, yet still effectively drives revenue for AfroTech.

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Exploring unconventional UX approaches

The site's uniqueness lies in its absence of filtering by news categories. However, to diversify the user experience and provide more freedom, we added search by tags and implemented two columns on the news page: one for the most popular articles and another for the updated ones.

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Growing Mobile User Engagement

AfroTech attracts numerous mobile visitors, so we prioritized crafting a responsive design to deliver the ultimate user experience on mobile devices.

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Shaping A Scalable Brand Identity

Our brand designers embarked on a mission to unify and enhance the AfroTech branding system, striving to distinguish them from conventional news platforms. The brand exudes vibrancy and energy, resonating perfectly with the youthful audience.

Lazarev developed a scalable system that enables AfroTech to expand its product line while maintaining consistency with the brand design system.

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Enhancing Visual Communication

To promote attendance at AfroTech events, educational programs, and other offerings, we embarked on creating converting visuals for the communication campaigns. These visuals aimed to highlight the distinctive features of each product while remaining consistent with Afrotech brand's design principles.

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Brands need to connect any of the available wallets to mint NFTs. On the consumer side, though, individuals without a wallet can create a new one on the fly by using their email or social media. Alternatively, they can purchase NFTs using fiat currency and complete the entire transaction without any knowledge of Web3.

The list of smart contracts on a green background

Brands need to connect any of the available wallets to mint NFTs. On the consumer side, though, individuals without a wallet can create a new one on the fly by using their email or social media. Alternatively, they can purchase NFTs using fiat currency and complete the entire transaction without any knowledge of Web3.

An assortment of crypto wallet options
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