About
Less than 1% of aid targets people living with disabilities, and even more scarce are the opportunities for these individuals to make a living. Founder, Sachi Dochi, envisions a new market to help artisans with disabilities in third world countries live a meaningful life through generating a sustainable stream of income selling handicrafts online.
Colorful Minds
Type
Web design,
Branding
Area
Ecommerce,
Graphic design
The Brief
The organization’s direct website is an extension of the business model. Despite a purpose-driven mission, the function of the website posed challenging for visitors to take action beyond digesting a wall of information.
We redesigned the website’s information architecture into a mission-driven e-commerce experience leading with products and making donation secondary to motivate visitors to take action.
The Decisions
Make impact transparent
Colorful Minds does more than share profits with artisans like depositing a check. Proceeds go towards medical and research funds, upskill partners, and to the direct artisan selling goods. Visualizing where visitors’ contribution sit in the supply chain makes the goal more tangible.
Not why, but who
People are inherently compassionate and want to do good. Having photo and media evidence of partners and individual artisans illicit human connection.
Storytelling sells
Each gift carries stories. Emphasizing the narrative behind the craft such as the traditional crafting techniques it preserves amplifies meaning.
The Outcome
Colorful Mind is hands-on volunteer and active participant in organized vendor events in California and we want the site to emulate that. We defined a color palette and aesthetic that mimics walking into a marketplace where customers attention is first pulled by the craft, the visual display of products, and then approaches the vendor to learn more, as is in the copywriting. Our hypothesis suggests a product-led model will lower friction. We delivered a full brand guide and prototyped website mock up for the developer to deploy.
The Impact
→ Overcame donation fatigue by leading with product presentation (e-commerce retail) while maintaining emotional benefits as all proceeds go to the cause
→ Increased SEO optimization with product catalog at the forefront, better search ability and share across social media
→ Diversified customers into brand ambassadors through word-of-mouth traffic retaining a more scalable revenue stream than pure reliance on donations
