Reflecting a Shifted Focus for Growing Nonprofit

Challenge: The successful nonprofit, New England Science & Sailing (NESS), had offered sailing instruction for many years and growing into an educational partner for families and schools to deliver ocean-based experiential learning. While the organization was widely recognized in the sailing community, educators weren’t as familiar. This made their educational programs a difficult sell, particularly because the outdated website was crowded, unclear, and difficult to navigate.

Proposal: I partnered with another contractor and together we recommended a marketing communications strategy to include audience personas, customer journey maps, strategic messaging, SEO strategy, editorial content, image and video selection (from assets provided by the client), graphic ideation (assets completed by the client) and website redesign to give NESS a base from which they could build successful marketing campaigns. My partner developed the SEO strategy, we both contributed to website redesign tasks, and I developed the personas, journey maps, web copy, graphic ideation, and image and video selection.

Outcome: A modern design with simpler navigation, compelling imagery, and clear messaging for an effective customer experience aimed at their target audience. The result

• reflected a vibrant, accredited educational organization for K-12 students that delivers academic outcomes in addition to sailing instruction;

• enabled website visitors, likely parents or educators, to easily navigate by the grade level they are interested in to explore offerings;

• featured data that reflects student success in graphics that are easy to find and understand; and

• included sample programs, a clear enrollment process, a call to action, and information that leaves customers knowing what to expect next.

These elements positioned the client for success in marketing campaigns that lead to program partnerships with K-12 educators and build the donor base. NESS contracted additional services that I provided to include storytelling ideation for the blog, an editorial calendar, and the blog posts themselves (one of which is included in Writing Samples on the Portfolio page) with relevant SEO and calls to action to use in email and social media campaigns.

Click through the image gallery below to see the outcome.