If there’s one thing that’s certain about SEI, it’s our commitment to change. We understand that no successful business has made it to where they are today without embracing the future and adapting to evolving industry trends and societal shifts. Change is good; change is necessary. In recognizing this fundamental need, we knew it was time to make some changes ourselves.
It’s been a few years since we last updated our website — and we certainly don’t have to tell you that the world has changed quite a bit since then. In an effort to embrace the future, meet evolving client demands, and seize new opportunities, we have launched a comprehensive revamp of our website in collaboration with our web development partner Thunderfoot. Our goal? To provide a seamless and engaging platform that not only showcases our offerings, but also reflects our commitment to innovation and quality.
Redesigning the Future
During this website overhaul, we redesigned several key pages, such as the homepage, location pages, and leadership page, to simplify the UX and UI, maximize the use of space, and convey information more effectively. In a world that’s only become even more fast-paced, we wanted to ensure we had a website where clients and potential talent alike could quickly learn exactly what we do, what we value, and who we are.
Breaking Down the Process
Like all good things, the first stage of the process was an in-depth planning session to understand where and how the current site could be improved. Several concepts were brainstormed in Miro, and once we had the possibilities narrowed down to a few solid concepts, the team moved into Figma to bring these ideas to life and better visualize the layout.
“We wanted to design a website that could encapsulate SEI’s forward-thinking and employee-driven culture while being in line with current visual and UX trends.” — Mercedes Lorenzo, Thunderfoot Creative Director
The Homepage
One of the biggest changes to the site was the homepage hero section. The design of this element would dictate the look of the rest of the site, so we knew we had to nail it. But aesthetics were only one part of the equation. We needed a hero that not only captured attention but also optimized performance and user engagement.
To answer that call, the performance-intensive WebGL slider was replaced with a simpler yet powerful hero that could deliver a seamless user experience without compromising visual impact and loading times.
Location & Leadership Pages
At SEI, our individual offices are the cornerstone of our company, and we wanted each to have a space to showcase what makes them unique. We focused on making changes that made the location pages feel more human and gave visitors a better understanding of each city’s distinctive qualities.
Our leadership page also underwent significant design changes, updating everything from adding bios for each leader to reorganizing the layout to maximize the use of space and feature the folks who help make SEI a top consulting firm of choice.
Site-Wide Changes
Rather than inundating visitors with too much information at once, we pared down the text for brevity across the site while still highlighting all the fantastic work we do and the people that make it happen. It was important that we give the text room to breathe, pushing us to be more selective about what we say to make the most impact.
To improve the user experience, we established a more defined hierarchy to help our guests quickly find what they need through thoughtful design and intentional use of color. Our intent was to create a more clean, cohesive, and current structure that modern users expect from today’s websites.
One of the most complex challenges we faced during this refresh was building out the navigation due to the amount of information we wanted to display. In an effort to make the navigation more accessible and modern, we simplified the existing options to include only the most relevant categories for visitors.
Technology Roundup
A lot goes into creating a beautiful site. Like a clock, much of its functionality lies where you can’t see — working non-stop to keep everything running smoothly. In addition to some of the tools mentioned earlier, we also utilized some of these technologies on the backend to enhance performance:
- Lazy Loading is a technique that postpones the loading of resources, such as images, scripts, and styles, until they’re needed. This helped us greatly reduce initial page load times.
- Dynamic Import is a JavaScript feature that allows modules to be loaded dynamically during program execution rather than loading them all at the beginning. This allowed us to load modules on demand in order to improve functionality.
- Vue is a JavaScript framework used for building interactive and reactive user interfaces. This framework enables a component-based approach, which improves code organization and maintainability.
- Custom Libraries were developed by Thunderfoot, including tabs, collapses, and accordions to meet the varied and specific needs of the site.
New Look, Same Great SEI
Like everything we do, this successful website overhaul was only achievable because of our incredible team — who bring their best to work each and every day and make growth like this possible. Without your commitment to excellence, your drive to innovate, and your willingness to learn, SEI wouldn’t be the company it is today.
We hope this has inspired you to consider what areas you can upgrade in your life or business. Change is the common denominator that links us all, and embracing it opens up a world of possibilities. Whether it’s adopting new technologies, reimagining strategies, or nurturing personal development, change empowers us to reach new heights and unlock our full potential.
We invite you to explore our new site and discover everything that’s changed. Our About Us page is a great place to start.
