{"id":7,"date":"2025-09-24T18:42:38","date_gmt":"2025-09-24T18:42:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.create.ou.edu\/ashleynorman\/?p=1"},"modified":"2026-01-31T23:16:44","modified_gmt":"2026-01-31T23:16:44","slug":"hello-world-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/2025\/09\/24\/hello-world-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Designing VisComm Website: Empathize"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Designing VisComm Website: Empathize<\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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When my team first started this project, we were excited to see how we could change the way people view and access the University of Oklahoma\u2019s Visual Communication website. As we moved through the early stages, we quickly realized that the project would require much more research than we initially anticipated. This research not only gave us the chance to work together in a collaborative setting but also shifted the way we approached and understood the design process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We started with a competitor analysis. For this, we began by identifying potential competitors to OU\u2019s Visual Communication program. To do this, we searched for Visual Communication degrees online and selected the top school websites that appeared. We considered these programs direct competitors since prospective students are most likely to encounter them first when exploring options. As we compared different sites, one of the biggest strengths we noticed was the use of strong visuals, particularly in how they showcased student work. Highlighting student achievements not only communicates the success of the program but also helps build student portfolios, which is a key factor for attracting new students. This emphasized the importance of OU\u2019s website design reflecting the essence of the program itself. At the same time, we found that some competitor websites struggled with weaknesses such as overwhelming amounts of text. To avoid this, our goal is to balance things out: offering enough content for visitors to understand the program\u2019s mission and opportunities, while keeping the design clean, visually engaging, and easy to use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To better understand our users\u2019 needs, our team conducted interviews with nine participants, so each of us completed three. The interviews I conducted were with a prospective Visual Communication student, a current senior in the program, and a parent of a Visual Communication student. These conversations revealed lots of information, particularly around the challenges of limited and confusing information, as well as difficulties with site navigation. We also learned that users place greater value on engaging visuals and examples of student success rather than large amounts of unnecessary text. What I found most interesting was hearing the unique perspectives of each participant, as they represented very different stages of life, yet shared similar concerns and expectations for the website. Conducting these interviews in person also proved especially valuable, as it encouraged more personal and detailed responses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the main challenges our team faced during the research process was finding time to balance our individual interviews while keeping each other updated on progress. We also struggled with creating effective interview questions. It was especially difficult because we needed to develop unique sets of questions for each participant, and we wanted to avoid making them too general or leading to simple yes-or-no answers. We overcame this by carefully considering what would resonate best with each interviewee and taking the time to refine our questions, so they were thoughtful and meaningful. Another challenge was scheduling the interviews themselves, which required patience and flexibility. By prioritizing this step and adapting our schedules, we were able to complete the process successfully\u2014and in the end, the effort was well worth it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the end, I found this entire process to be very rewarding. The challenges were worthwhile because overcoming them made the project run more smoothly and ultimately led to success. I learned the importance of thinking more critically about every aspect of the work\u2014including the design itself. This project showed me that redesigning a website isn\u2019t just about making it look better \u2014 it\u2019s about listening, analyzing, and designing with purpose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Designing VisComm Website: Empathize When my team first started this project, we were excited to see how we could change the way people view and access the University of Oklahoma\u2019s Visual Communication website. As we moved through the early stages, we quickly realized that the project would require much more research than we initially anticipated. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":549,"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7\/revisions\/549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sova.ourcloud.ou.edu\/anorman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}