Brand
Introduction
Northampton Community College is a public community college in Pennsylvania with campuses in Bethlehem Township in Northampton County and Tannersville in Monroe County.
Our goal for this project was to communicate and help current and prospective students how to select the ideal career for them using story telling videos and interactive content.
One of the most powerful tools for this project we considered was to use videos of real students who will tell their stories and experiences. By using these videos in conjunction with interactive content students could acquire better knowledge of the areas they are interested in and therefore be able to make a better decision in their career upon entering college.
Understanding the problem
There were many students who do not have a concrete idea of what they would like to study. Many of these students ended up changing careers or dropping out of college because they made a bad decision.
Career assesment tests can help you choose a variety of careers that might suit you. These assesments focus on a specific area, such as skills, interests, or values.
In our discovery we realize that these tests can be a bit boring according to new and recurring students. In order to make the students have a better experience we decided to make personal videos using real students who tell their stories. Once the student has been captured by the visuals it would be a lot easier and more pleasant to take the assessment tests.
A problem is a chance for you to do your best.
Duke Ellington
My role
As the UI/UX expert I directed the user experience and visual designs for the microsite, I created wireframes, interactive prototypes, hi-fidelity designs and front end development.
One of the essential parts for this project was to make a user research to understand and find the problems that we would have to solve. I conducted several research methods including surveys, usability testing and video interviews that were recorded by the video team.
I also collaborated with a back-end developer to integrate the Education API within the microsite.
The solution
Since Digital Feast is considered a storyteller company and one of the strongest tools was the creation of videos we decided to make several interactive videos using the VERSE platform, which is one of the best interactive video platforms which allowed us to add and integrate external APIs.
By creating these interactive videos we gave the user the power to navigate the videos and interact with the content of the visuals according to their preferences.
We studied and analyzed well the target audience in order to have a better understanding of the platform we were going to create, not only the videos but also content and graphics on the microsite that can be accessed from any electronic device.
The outcome
With more than 68,324 video reproductions and more than 12 thousand pageviews within a week, we obtained an excellent result compared to the previous page that only had a link to take the assesments tests. This project was well received by all users.
Throughout this project I learned a lot about career choices, how students and users interact with technology today. I also learned a lot to listen to the user and their demands, what is and is not important for them and how to collect and interpret all that data to obtain a better product, in this case it was a microsite which was a great success.
