This post is protected. To view it, enter the password below!
This post is protected. To view it, enter the password below!
This post is protected. To view it, enter the password below!
It was an open call to photographers, graphic designers, illustrators and art directors: Let your next work go to stray dogs and cats as food. We get stray dogs in Istanbul food by selling your work.
Istanbul boasts a population of 14 million people, making it the eighth-largest city in the world. But it is the city’s estimated 150,000 stray cats and dogs that draw a lot of attention. For centuries, locals have left out food and water for their beloved street creatures.
When Turkey’s Ministry of Forestry and Water drafted a law that would send city dogs to “wildlife parks” on city outskirts, thousands of animal rights activists were outraged. The law was set aside because of broad opposition.
I decided to run a fundraising campaign to get thousands of stray dogs food and shelter as well as make an attempt to raise awareness on loving animals.
Illustrators, art directors, graphic designers, and photographer friends sent their works and we sold them on the campaign website.
Product Strategy
Branding
Product Design
User Experience
Design System
I lead the product development, focusing on creating a human-entered platform that fits our design and user experience goals. My main goal is to improve mentorship and feedback journeys, making it easy for aspiring creatives to engage with mentors.
We follow a research-driven approach, constantly refining our design through user feedback, interviews, and prototype testing. This iterative process allows us to create a user-centered platform that meets the needs of our audience.
Platforms such as Behance, Dribbble, and ADPlist often lacked in-depth and insigthful feedback on design & creative projects.
First, before touching anything related to design, I wanted to dive into the psychology, needs, and motivations of our potential users.
Since the mentoring and project showcase sectors are already crowded, I wanted to look into what was working well and what could be improved.
Behance:
✅ Simplified dashboard
❌ Mentorship
❌ Feedback tool
❌ 1:1s
✅ Direct Messages
✅ Landing pages
✅ Online store
Dribbble:
✅ Simplified dashboard
❌ Mentorship
❌ Feedback tool
❌ 1:1s
✅ Direct Messages
✅ Landing pages
✅ Online store
ADPList:
✅ Simplified dashboard
✅ Mentorship
❌ Feedback tool
✅ 1:1s
✅ Direct Messages
❌ Landing pages
❌ Online store
After observing the psychology + competition in this market, I wanted to know firsthand about our target audiences’ experiences so that I could tailor the final product to them.
Questions:
81
young creatives
95+
data points
4
main insights
3
different flows
Participants emphasized mentorship and feedback for their professional development as designers. They see access to experienced mentors and insightful feedback as crucial for refining skills, learning new techniques, and navigating career paths effectively.
Participants specified desired features for a mentorship and feedback platform like DesignGost. They value user-friendly communication channels for connecting with mentors, structured feedback systems providing actionable insights, and access to diverse professionals across various design disciplines.
Interviewees stressed the importance of long-term relationship building on mentorship platforms. They seek features facilitating ongoing connections with mentors, enabling continuous learning, mentorship, and growth over time. Building lasting relationships with mentors is crucial for gaining deeper insights and advancing careers.
Participants highlighted emotional support and satisfaction in their user experience. They desire features prioritizing emotional well-being, such as supportive communities, encouragement from mentors, and recognition of achievements, contributing to overall satisfaction with the platform.
Improve Design Skills:
Aims to enhance her design skills by receiving constructive feedback from experienced professionals and learning new techniques.
Advance Career:
Wants to advance her career by networking with industry experts, gaining insights into career growth opportunities, and building a strong portfolio.
Gain Confidence:
Emily seeks to boost her confidence as a designer by receiving validation and recognition for her work, as well as overcoming imposter syndrome.
Impactful Design:
Aspires to create designs that have a meaningful impact on users’ lives, whether by solving complex problems, improving accessibility, or promoting inclusivity and diversity in design solutions.
When it came to design, I first spent two weeks experimenting with three distinct approaches. Do not even touch the UI; focus solely on the experience and flow.
After the soft launch, we continually iterated the designs, making some major improvements based on the various feedback we received.
We needed to create a design system that is easy to use, aligned with code, and flexible enough to handle creating new features quickly.
Meticulously assembled the typography scale, which informed the entire sizing system based on line-heights and font sizes, ensuring flawless compatibility among all components. Furthermore, our color system was crafted with easy theming in mind, while maintaining strict adherence to WCAG standards for accessibility throughout the process.
We approached component creation with atomic design principles in mind. This involved creating a diverse range of sizes for our base components such as buttons and input controls. These components can be easily adjusted using our assembled container components like cards, lists, and accordions. Throughout this process, our focus remained on the end user, ensuring that each component is intuitive to use.
To ensure a seamless dev handoff, we crafted a functional requirements document, with ongoing assistance including providing feedback to our devs throughout the build process and addressing any new edge cases.
The strategy of launching a soft MVP in a tiny market, Turkey, to improve our product was successful.
450+
Mentors
6000+
Users
750+
Projects
80+
Weekly new users
Ahmet Ertas, Back-End Engineer
Orhan Ince, Full-Stack Engineer
Emre Ertan, Front-End Engineer
Mesut Ugurlu – Creative Director
Ibexa helps B2B companies to stay relevant and succeed by transforming traditional sales strategies into frictionless buying experiences
UX Design
Research was the most important part that led me to the right direction while working on UX design. This was the fundamental part that we needed to take care of. I started with accumulating all the data from research and started planning prototypes.
A site map or a visual diagram usually composes of a list of web pages. In this particular case I made it more real by using some thumbnails.
After playing with various structures and styles to find out the best viable solution, we established clear goals with the marketing and product team during the exploration phases. We tried different approaches to solve complex challenges in the wireframing process.
After created all the components, I jumped into the final UI design phase. I followed all the wireframes and applied the components from the design system.
The goal was to create a modern, flat, and a dynamic design style that would allow us to elevate the Ibexa brand, and deliver the messages in a more user friendly environment.
UI/UX, Illustration, Web, Branding
Continue reading
UI/UX, Illustration, Web, Branding
Continue reading
Concept, Art Direction
Continue reading
UI/UX, Web, Branding
Continue reading