UNI - web portal - Exciting and accessible experiences to talk about standardization

Think - Narrate - Create

A new web portal to guide people through the house of standardization.

Services

Design Ops
UI Design
Experience Mapping
Design Thinking
Brand Design
Areas

Standardization

We helped UNI, the Italian National Standards Body, rethink their uni.com website.

We were in charge of redesigning the user experience and visual identity of the new portal, facilitating the project from the envisioning phase all the way to production.

The most challenging aspect we faced? Combining the informational and emotional dimensions through experiences that were, first and foremost, usable and accessible. In fact, the site was designed and developed to be accessible, in accordance with the UNI CEI EN 301549:2021 standard.

Who is UNI

UNI is the reference body in Italy for the creation of technical standards. Founded in 1921, it brings together experts from various industries and institutions to develop norms that define quality and safety standards for a wide range of sectors. UNI also actively participates in international standardization processes, ensuring that Italian standards are aligned with global regulations. It also provides access to its technical standards to help companies implement best practices.

Facilitating the project

The first step was envisioning activities on the new portal. Through collaborative workshops, we involved all the stakeholders from the different areas of UNI, creating a shared vision on targets, goals, and content.

Our research activity then focused on the different types of users and their journeys. From this work emerged the set of opportunities and pain points related to user experience, from which we started to formulate the first hypotheses of the new portal.

The new website

Through a series of iterations with the working group, we validated initial wireframe and information architecture proposals. Findability, navigation simplification, store integration, immersive experiences, and customer centric storytelling , were some of the elements that guided this phase.
On the one hand, we had to respond to the needs of the frequent users of the site, whether technicians or associates, who need to reach a particular standard or information as quickly and efficiently as possible; on the other hand, we needed to guide people to discover the UNI world, through an immersive experience, that would “accompany them in the house of standardization.”

A brand new identity

In parallel with the research activities, we worked on the new visual identity. The starting point was the re-brand, which UNI had recently completed to celebrate its first 100 years of history. We transformed the group’s brand guidelines into a new digital visual language, full of identifying elements designed to best represent UNI’s values and vision: from the revamped typography to the new iconography, from the centrality of images to the accessibility-oriented color system.

Accessibility

The new portal was designed and developed to be fully accessible. Each page of the site had to meet the requirements defined by the WCAG 2.1 AA, in accordance with UNI CEI EN 301549:2021. The work on accessibility consisted of two main streams: design and training. Regarding the first aspect, each stage of the design and development process was accompanied by a series of accessibility validations. This enabled designers and developers to identify and correct any accessibility issues early on. As for the training aspect, crucial was the training of UNI content editors on best practices for the creation of accessible content, an essential element in ensuring the accessibility of the site in the stages following its going online.