"Happy to recommend to other organisations looking to build or overhaul their website"

Detailed Review

Before the Clade team began major deployment, they employed a thorough design process. They contacted us through video live conference for the first time and to understand our requirements. This phase was us briefing them on our current design problem giving them what we need/requirements on our website, the constraints, the deadline, and areas of focus. From there, they analysed our brand and website which we also give them company related material such as our product catalogue for reference. We have also filled out a Target Audience Persona document from them which is used to better understand the key individuals that would be using our website.

The next meeting with them was the team showing us their research and key points they found from the old website, pointing out design issues and flaws of our existing website along with branding direction. They went through with us of the components, the approaches and design choices, from the colours, typography, types of stock images, and overall layout plan while explaining their design decisions to be used in the solution. Having the mock-up created we were given the opportunity to review it. We requested them to make a few changes here and there for a variety of reasons relating to the company branding, which they complied with and made changes until we gave them the approval to begin the development of the main website. Throughout the process, the team were highly active in their emails replying no less than 48 hours, and going as far as to bring in their lead designer to personally explain the design situation and choices.

By the time they completed the main website, they have alerted us the website is ready for deployment. This is where we believe the company could look to consider improving as they did not give us the option to look at the website as a staging ground for us to look for ourselves and critique. In fact, we had to ask them for the staging website which they happily gave us. Whether the product is internally tested or not, we do think it is important that we as the client should be able to see the working prototype to test and analyse so we know exactly what the end product will be. It is something the team should show or give once they completed their internal testing phase and move on to the "client approving" phase, it is something we should not chase them for. Anyway, when we looked at the completed staging website, there were few problems needing to be fixed before deployment. With all the issues fixed and other tweaks made and giving them our final approval, they began the final deployment and decommission the old website. The website at the end works and looked the way it was originally designed, the end product met our expectations and we along with all our employees were satisfied.

Final thoughts

Clade Technology has developed a well-made and aesthetically pleasing website for us. Its highly user experienced focused with varying degrees of interactivity and visual effects, making the website more lively. It carries a modern visual aesthetic along with modern design elements in line with several trends. The team has fully communicated with us throughout the design phase and responded to our feedback and requests in a timely manner. They have also explained all the design decisions throughout as a reason why they design it this way. Overall, the Company have created a solution that fully addresses the design problem in our old websites and made it highly appealing and unique. We are happy with the new website they have developed for us and happy to recommend them to other organisations looking to develop or overhaul their website.