MetalTek

Website Design | Digital Strategy 

MetalTek International is a metal casting manufacturing specializing in high temperature, severe wear, and harsh corrosive environments.

The Situation

  • MetalTek came to Northwoods with a lot of website content, but that content lacked organization, resulting in user confusion.
  • Pages were missing clear calls to action to help users naturally flow through the website.
  • The site design also needed a fresh, modern look. 

The Solution

  • Northwoods consolidated the site’s information architecture by reducing the number of pages displayed in the utility and main navigation - almost by half. Drop-down navigation was added to help users get to specific content more quickly. 
  • Page content was given more structure and division to help visitors easily digest it. 

 

Homepage Design

MetalTek has a wide variety of services for many different industries. Northwoods designers made sure that users could easily see the full breadth of MetalTek’s capabilities with a quick scan of the homepage. A video plays in the background of the hero image to capture the audience’s attention and provide insight into their culture. 

Careers Page

MetalTek uses photography and video of their own people to foster authenticity and trust. Providing consumers with real images that show how the company operates behind the scenes evokes a positive emotional response to their brand, which is critical to building a connection with potential employees. 

Overall Website Design

Breadcrumbs appear on each of the interior website pages so users are always aware of where they are on the site and can easily get back to specific pages, improving the user experience. This is particularly critical on content-dense websites.

MetalTek’s previous color palette didn’t include royal blue. Instead, it featured grays and yellows. Northwoods designers added a royal blue because of its versatility and ability to inspire trust.

The royal blue also works well with much of their imagery, which already contains blue tones. Adding blue also helps the yellow call to action color stand out more.  

One of the biggest improvements to the site design is the display of complex data. Their alloy data (shown below) is managed in spreadsheets and contains information on chemical composition, product specifications, mechanical properties, and more. Bar counters add movement to the mechanical properties, and color blocking and icons are used to clearly segment different data components. Conditional logic is used to account for data variations, so the design remains intact even when certain data fields are missing. 

The Outcome

  • MetalTek’s new website design has a much more friendly, approachable aesthetic that makes large amounts of content easier for users to digest. 
  • Improved content organization, stronger calls to action and an improved user experience has resulted in better user engagement by keeping users moving naturally through the website. 

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