The mission was clear. The path to act on it wasn’t.

OMG WOW

Redesigned OMG WOW’s nonprofit website to help women explore programs, connect with mentors, and take meaningful action. Focused on clarity, trust, and visible impact to create a mission-driven, engaging experience.

Role
UX Designer

Duration
9 Weeks

Team
Collaborated on stakeholder interviews; led all design and prototyping independently

Tools
Figma, Miro, Google Docs

Problem and Opportunity

Visitors were inspired by OMG WOW’s mission but often struggled to explore programs, take action or see the impact of their contributions. This friction left users unsure how to engage, limiting participation and slowing organizational growth.

Opportunity: Redesign the platform to clearly showcase programs, communicate benefits and highlight real-world impact. Reducing friction and making value visible would build trust and motivate visitors to join, donate and volunteer.

Research and Discovery

The process started with a heuristic analysis of the existing site and a competitive review of four comparable organizations Step Up, Black Girl White Coat, Women's Fund of Santa Barbara and Black Girls Code. All four operated in a single lane: youth mentoring, one career track, local grant making, or STEAM skills. None supported adult women across multiple life areas with a fully integrated membership model. That gap confirmed the opportunity and framed the redesign direction.

The heuristic analysis surfaced five specific problems with the existing site: the mission wasn't clear on entry, CTAs were inconsistent and hard to find, the separate FRESH platform created brand confusion, there was almost no impact data to build donor trust, and the visual design felt dated and text-heavy.

A stakeholder interview, three user personas, jobs-to-be-done frameworks, and a journey map followed. Three distinct user types emerged, each with a different job to do on the site. Maya (new member) needs a low-friction path to join and a clear sense of what she is getting. Rachel (donor) needs to see tangible impact before she gives, her core frustration is feeling disconnected from the results of her donation. Aisha (volunteer/mentor) needs structure and a clear sense that her time will be well-used. The journey map tracked Maya from social media discovery through free trial signup, identifying where hesitation peaked and where design had the most leverage.

Design Process

Flowchart of a landing hero page with paths for partnership, member, and volunteer options, detailing steps to support a mission, start a journey, and get involved.

Pathways Flow Diagram

From research I built a navigation sitemap consolidating scattered entry points into five clear top-level sections: About Us, How It Works, Get Involved, Our Impact and Contact. Each section was mapped to a specific user path: donor, member, volunteer and partner. So every visitor type had a direct route without hunting.

A webpage layout with sections including a navigation menu, hero section with placeholder buttons, partnership logos, mission statement, program descriptions, call-to-action buttons, and a footer with quick links and contact information.

Wireframe Progression

Wireframes went through three iterations. The first established the basic structure and content hierarchy. The second introduced impact metrics (120 small businesses launched, 1,000 women mentored) at the homepage level, making the mission tangible before any scroll. The third refined the membership tier comparison and the donation page to connect each giving amount to a specific outcome. $25 covers one month of community membership, $50 funds Level Up for one woman and $80 covers Premium.

Homepage of OMG Women Outreach Women website featuring a smiling woman with dreadlocks, navigation menu, call-to-action buttons, program details, and photos of diverse women engaged in community activities.
Homepage of OMG Women Outreach Women, featuring images of smiling women, program information, and options to support or join the organization.

Design Iteration Screenshots

The core design principle across all iterations: no user should reach a commitment moment without already understanding what their action makes possible.

Screenshot of two webpages supporting women, featuring images of women smiling and a section highlighting the impact and mentorship programs for women.

The Redesign Strengthened Clarity and Trust.

Enabling visitors to explore programs, become members and contribute with confidence in a more mission-driven platform.

Screenshot of a mentorship webpage featuring profiles of four women, with details about their names, roles, and expertise, and with a search bar to find mentors by expertise.
Image of a group of smiling diverse women, sitting in a row, attending a seminar or workshop.
A webpage featuring information about the FRESH mentorship program, including images of women, program overview, and a call-to-action button.

Features

OMG WOW didn't have a membership tier structure before this project. The three tiers: Community, Level Up, and Premium were created as part of the redesign. Built around the organization's existing mentorship model and educational programming. Each tier maps to a different level of commitment and need, from free trial access to 1:1 mentorship and full program access.

Each of the four redesigned sections maps directly to a friction point identified in the heuristic analysis and user research.

A webpage showing membership options for a women-focused program. Contains a banner with smiling women, a description about belonging and growth, and three membership tiers: Community, Level Up, and Premium, each with details and pricing.

Become a Member

An educational experience that clearly explains membership tiers and helps women choose the level of support that fits their goals. Benefits are transparent and easy to compare, making it simple to join with confidence.

A website homepage for OMG WOW featuring a woman with glasses smiling in an outdoor setting, with text about community support and involvement, and sections on how to get involved with options to donate, volunteer, and partner

Get Involved

A single hub presenting three ways to engage: donate, volunteer or partner. Clear pathways help visitors quickly find the option that aligns with how they want to support OMG WOW.

A donation webpage for OMG WOW, featuring a header with navigation links and a maroon 'Donate' button. The page has a large smiling group photo of diverse women at the top. Below, there is a section encouraging donations with descriptions of how donated funds support women’s programs, membership options, impact options, and a fundraising progress bar indicating $1500 raised or 15% of the goal.

Donate

A transparent giving experience showing how contributions are used and the impact they create. Clear options and meaningful context help donors feel confident their support is making a real difference.

Screenshot of a webpage for OMG WOW Mentorship. The page features three mentors: Sofia Ramirez, a wellness mentor; Aisha Khan, an entrepreneur and leadership mentor; and Nia Johnson, a financial mentor. Each mentor has a profile picture, name, title, and a quote. Below, there are buttons to become a mentor or meet mentors. The section below shows testimonials from members, with their photos, names, titles, and quotes about their experience.

Mentorship

An overview of the mentorship program highlighting value, outcomes and real stories. Social proof builds trust and shows women how they can be supported, guided and thrive within the community.

Homepage Survey

Before finalizing the homepage direction, I ran a quick preference survey testing two layout and image options. The goal was specific. Did the design feel welcoming and inclusive to the women OMG WOW actually serves? The homepage needed to say “you belong here" before a visitor read a single line of copy.

The warm, authentic direction tested clearly stronger. Rotating images of women of all ages and backgrounds created an immediate sense of recognition. The kind of belonging that makes a new visitor feel seen before they've decided whether to stay. That response informed the final direction and the image selection criteria going forward.

A woman with dark curly hair and wearing a yellow top smiling, sitting in front of another woman with long blonde hair. They are in a bright room with a window in the background, having a conversation.
Close-up of a woman with dreadlocks smiling, wearing hoop earrings and a beige jacket, on a website supporting women through mentorship and community programs.

Validation and Reflection

I presented findings and design recommendations directly to the OMGWOW stakeholders. The redesign addressed three compounding problems the organization had been living with: the FRESH platform operating as a separate identity from the nonprofit, creating brand confusion that undermined both; inconsistent CTAs that left users without a clear path to act; and a visual language that didn't signal the credibility members and donors expect before giving or joining.

The biggest shift was bringing the platform and the nonprofit into a unified identity. That single change resolved the trust gap the heuristic analysis had flagged. Users weren't converting not because they didn't care about the mission but because the experience didn't feel like an organization that had its act together.

Donation page decisions were deliberately modeled on patterns from established nonprofits. Familiarity matters here. Donors have learned to trust certain layouts, certain ways of connecting a giving amount to a specific outcome. Reinventing that pattern would have introduced friction at exactly the wrong moment.

Voice clarity turned out to be the most immediate win. Once the messaging consistently reflected who OMG WOW actually is and who they serve, the path through the site became legible in a way it hadn't been before.

If I were to continue, I would test with existing users to measure whether the changes hold up for people who already have a relationship with the organization. The redesign reduced confusion for new visitors but the more interesting question is whether current members now feel clearer about what's available to them, what things cost, and what membership actually means day to day. A more legitimate-feeling platform should raise engagement and referrals, that's the hypothesis worth testing.