Forty years of expertise, finally visible online
How a website refresh grew into a brand and a full rebuild for Human Reliability, and more than doubled the traffic coming through it.
A specialist business, and a site that had not kept pace
Human Reliability has spent forty years helping organisations improve safety and productivity through human factors, across consultancy, software and training. The website had simply not kept pace with the business behind it.
In their own words it had started to feel dated, built in an older style with little interactivity, and it was not yet doing justice to the depth of expertise in the team.
There was also something more fundamental. Like a lot of established consultancies whose reputation has been built on the work rather than the marketing, they had never needed formal brand guidelines. That meant no agreed colour palette, typography or visual rules for a designer to work from.
Start with the foundations, then build on them
The original brief was to refresh a handful of pages. Talking it through, we suggested a different order of work. Without agreed brand rules, each new page would be a judgement call, and the site would drift out of step again.
So we resequenced it. Create the brand, write the guidelines, then design and build a site that carries them, so the website, social and training materials all pull in the same direction.
One thing shaped every decision. Human Reliability exists to put people at the centre of systems, so the brand and the site had to feel human rather than industrial.
We built the foundation, then the site
Suggested a different starting point
They came to us wanting a few pages redesigned. We put the case for starting with the brand instead, and they were quick to see the value in it. It made the project bigger, and it made the result last.
Built the brand foundations
Five days of brand development: logo rules, core and supporting palettes, typography for print and screen, and a visual identity framework to design everything else against.
Gave them a motif and a grid
A rounded box motif with a rule of three grid, echoing the shapes used in process mapping, so layouts stay consistent whoever builds them.
Made the photography human
Guidelines that call for people in real work settings, candid rather than posed, in situ rather than studio, and always in colour. The brand values, visible in every image.
Planned the site before designing it
A scoping session on objectives and page types, a live site mapping session, keyword research turned into an SEO treemap, then wireframes edited live with the team until everyone agreed.
Designed and built it
Eight page templates designed from the signed-off wireframes, built across 29 core pages and 17 SEO landing pages, with hosting and migration handled so they kept full ownership.
Added the parts beyond a normal web build
Two promotional films, an explainer video for their SHERPA software, and a day of professional staff photography for a growing team.
The brand we built, in four words
The results
In their words
Website Development
Scoped, designed, written and built, with the brand work underneath it and support that does not stop at launch.
See the serviceHas your website fallen behind the business you've become?
Fifteen minutes, free, no pitch deck. If we are not right for you, we will say so and point you somewhere better.
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