Using Research and Human-Centered Design to Engage Across Audiences

Brookdale Senior Living owns and operates over 1,000 senior living communities and retirement communities in the United States with a mission to enrich the lives of those they serve.

BRAND & AUDIENCE INSIGHTS

As the largest operator of senior living communities, Brookdale is on a mission to revolutionize the industry through genuine engagement with residents and their families. While geographically expanding over the past decade, Brookdale underwent a cultural reinvention, ultimately coinciding in a rebranding process. This new brand unified their staff and employees, but also brought a new visual perspective to their communities and coincided with a relaunch of their website.

In order to ensure that their campaign landing pages remained optimized and relevant, Nebo underwent a retrospective research process that evaluated usability trends and the effects of past User Experience Optimization (UXO) testing on existing landing pages to best determine the future needs of visitors. This process involved a review of analytics data, heatmapping, session recording, as well as A/B test result reviews.

SOLVING THE PROBLEM

Nebo worked closely with Brookdale to understand the new brand architecture from both a visual and messaging perspective. Equipped with the proper context and access to an expanded library of images, we went about redesigning the new landing page accounting for the priorities outlined during the research phase of the project.

By simplifying the page design and focusing on fewer elements that required user interaction to view content, Nebo developed a straightforward, honest, and casual approach to the landing page experience, where conversion opportunities are present, but not pushy, and information desired by visitors is well-organized, presented in a proven order, and of a sufficient level of detail. 

This new design was rolled out as part of an A/B test, giving us the opportunity to evaluate exactly how the changes we made impacted metrics without the confounding variables of a complex marketing environment. 

RESULTS

The research-driven, human-centered approach to design was successful, significantly improving conversion rates on the page by +62%. The design was rolled out across other landing pages, accompanied by similar rounds of testing, and showed subsequent success in each, from +25% to +72%.