Transforming the HVAC Digital Experience: Enhancing Online Presence
Masters Building Solutions is a manufacturer’s representative firm that specializes in high-quality engineered solutions for sustainable design, along with premium energy-efficient HVAC and building automation systems. Their website and LinkedIn pages aim to showcase the HVAC components they offer, highlight case studies of completed projects, and promote their services.
Role: Social Media & UX Designer
Year: 2024, ongoing
Challenge
Masters aims to modernize their website and social media presence to attract a diverse range of clients. Currently, their website feels outdated in terms of design, and they have only three LinkedIn posts, lacking a cohesive design strategy. The goal of this initiative is to establish a broad design framework that can be applied across their new website and social media platforms, fostering brand consistency and cohesiveness.
Opportunity
Designing from the ground up can seem daunting, but it presents an exciting opportunity to establish a lasting standard for the entire company. Given their significant growth in recent years, it’s essential to capture this evolution through modern branding that truly reflects their progress and vision for the future.
My Impact
I am the sole designer for this project, collaborating with the president and other managers to collect employee feedback on the current website interface and identify potential improvements. Additionally, I serve as the primary branding designer for our social media, where I analyze trends and analytics to guide our design and posting strategies.
Process
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Process -
One major issue we've identified with the website is that it only offers a superficial view of the company, lacking customer reviews and insights into our company culture. With the modernization initiative, I aim to create a prototype that highlights the people behind the company. In discussions with current employees, we began considering our clients' experiences and created user personas to better understand their needs. We found that while the website is functional—allowing users to quickly access information for ordering parts or contacting Masters for services—it lacks visual appeal. My next step is to transform the existing content into a modern design that maintains easy navigation.
For the social media strategy, I researched the pages of companies we currently serve, noting their posting schedules and types of content. From this analysis, I began designing templates for general posts, such as announcements for new hires or company anniversaries.
Elevating Social Media Presence
I’m currently in the early stages of developing Masters’ social media presence. Given their strong following on LinkedIn, my focus has been on building that platform first, with plans to expand to other social media channels if they align with our target demographic. Since we began our consistent posting schedule, page views have increased by 27.9%, and we've gained 19 new followers in just a month and a half. This progress is encouraging as we continue to enhance our online presence!
Design updates
I’m currently building a new website using Squarespace and will start incorporating Figma into the design process as I add new pages. Below is a walkthrough of the site featuring stock photos and experimenting with a color palette that complements our logo. Management, along with the company president, emphasized the importance of incorporating images and videos, as well as adding transitions between pages. So far, I’ve focused on developing base concepts for a few landing pages and will continue to refine them as the design process progresses.
Conclusion
Both of these projects are ongoing and will evolve as we gather more insights. For the website, we plan to continually integrate user personas to guide updates to the layout and design. This approach will help us better understand our audience's needs and preferences, allowing us to create a more intuitive and engaging experience.