Environment Funders Canada

A New Face for Environmental Philanthropic Funding

Environment Funders Canada catalyzes funders to respond to environmental crises with ambitious and innovative solutions. By facilitating learning, connection and collaboration, our efforts are bolder, smarter and stronger.

About

Environment Funders Canada is a network that catalyzes 75+ diverse philanthropic funders to respond to environmental crises in Canada with ambitious and innovative solutions that also address intersecting economic, social, equity and wellbeing challenges. Their primary audiences are EFC members visiting the site to access materials through a members-only section, and other organizations interested or involved in environmental philanthropy.

The Challenge

In 2019, the organization changed its name to Environment Funders Canada (EFC). With this rebrand, it became apparent that their website needed a refresh and their digital presence had room for improvement. They now needed a new website that had to be fast, mobile-friendly, SEO-optimized, easy to navigate and bilingual. It also needed to have member-only sections, a blog, contact forms with SalesForce integration and social media links.

The Approach

Environment Funders Canada’s website was very text heavy and confusing to navigate for its users. It was also lacking bilingual content. To rectify these issues, we designed and developed a new website from the ground up, leveraging EFC’s brand guidelines to create a final product that embodied their core mission.

Our first order of business was to completely overhaul the site’s information architecture with a focus on improving the user experience. We implement a visual style to make information easier to parse and engage with.

Building a better website

With the goal of creating seamless UX for both members and the general public, our first stop was to establish information architecture that organized all of the existing content into three organizing pillars: Learn, Connect and Collaborate. We then created a visual style using EFC’s brand colours to make it clear to users which pillar the content they are viewing belongs to.

Improved Readability

With the end goal of improving user experience, we paid close attention to how information was presented on each page. Our goal was to improve page readability by adding more visual elements and negative space on the page to make it easier for users to find and understand the information they’re looking for.

Information Architecting

By focusing on creating information architecture that prioritized ease of use, we created three organizing pillars: Learn, Connect and Collaborate. Within these pillars we categorized content into topic clusters to better serve users content relevant to their needs.

Colour Scheme and Visual Style

Creating a visual style was integral to our strategy for improving the website’s UX. We implemented EFCs brand colour palette to distinguish between the three organizing pillars. We also created visual elements to break up long texts and to call out when something was an article, video or webinar.

Content for a Bilingual Audience

As EFC represents a diverse membership from across Canada, it was important to provide content in both official languages. Prior to the development of the new website, EFC only had a single page in French. We facilitated the creation of a French version of the website to serve native French speakers in Canada.

Clarified Value Prop

As EFC’s website features a members-only section with exclusive content, it was important that we demonstrated to non-members the value of membership. To that end, content was created to present EFC’s value proposition We also implemented previews of member-only content in the “relevant content” sections to give users a sense of what they’re missing out on.

New Name, New Website

A fresh and responsive take on environmental funding

With a fresh, responsive and SEO-optimized website, EFC is thrilled to offer members and non-members alike an informative and engaging user experience. The visual style makes information easier to parse and understand, creating a greater benefit to users. The clear distinction between types of content has also greatly improved navigation within the website. EFC are now positioned to generate greater value for their members through exclusive content and features.