dilworth
Websites & Apps

Urban Engineers

Urban Engineers is a complex organization with a rich history of engineering excellence. We helped them best represent their large range of services with a clear and flexible system. 

 

The Client Need

Urban Engineers was at a significant moment, transitioning leadership and looking for a website that would celebrate and capture the legacy and history of the organization while looking to the future. Given it was only the company’s third change in leadership since its founding in 1960, it was ever-crucial to do this right.  

ue imac

Goals for the project

  • Recognize past projects and accomplishments while looking to the future.
  • Capture the human side of engineering and the individuals that make up the organization.
  • Capture the breadth, quality and impact of their work.
  • Reflect the culture, community and values that make up the organization.  
ue mobile screens

Our Work

Our process for the redesign included a heavy emphasis on content and a focus on people.

Interviews & Surveys

These touch points allowed our team to get in-depth insights from their internal staff, as well as current and former clients. We explored project goals, needs and audiences for the website as well as the Urban Engineers brand and the experience of working with them.

Review of Analytics

Analytics revealed insights into how users are currently using the site. This insight informed and validated our work, and empowered their team to prioritize and streamline content going forward.

Workshops

We explored the core values of the individuals that make up the organization, which helped capture the spirit and mission of Urban Engineers. We were able to use those insights, along with key goals for the website, to frame decision-making in collaborative, participatory exercises that focused on their brand, content and visuals.

card sorting
cardsorting

Content Strategy

We partnered with a content strategist from the beginning to ensure this complex organization — one with a wealth of services, projects and content — could effectively communicate who they are, what they do and who they serve. This work resulted in key messaging, site maps, content workshops and a content governance guide.

ue contentguide

Brand Refresh

Members of their internal team felt they needed an updated the logo, but the organization was not ready for a full redesign of their visual identity. They felt having an outside voice who could recommend slight tweaks to the current mark might help move that process along. Our team maintained the structure of the mark but updated the typeface to compliment the typography in the newly designed site.

ue logorefresh

 

The Outcome

Humanizing the work and organization

“We're people working for people.” Showing the human side of Urban Engineers and engineering was a key priority. Because engineering often happens in the background of our lives, we never quite notice its impact until something goes wrong — so it was important to highlight that the places we live, work and play are designed by people, for the people.

Highlighting people

Our research revealed that when it comes to hiring decisions, Urban Engineers believes that the services they offer are secondary to the specific people working on the project. In addition to celebrating their team and humanizing the organization, this became a key strategy in highlighting their talent and expertise to help win projects. We created multiple ways to highlight the faces of the organization (leadership, team members, and the board), connect people to projects, and and provide easy paths to get in touch with the Urban Engineers team.

ue screens

Provided clarity internally and externally

From the beginning, we knew that we needed to pay special attention to how Urban Engineers organizes and categorizes its markets and services. With a dedicated content strategist working closely with their marketing team, we offered them a content structure and key messaging that not only effectively communicates what they do and who they serve in a concise, clear way on their website – but that can also be used in any of their communication touchpoints and marketing materials going forward.

Highlighted impact and breadth of work

With a truly impressive portfolio and expansive breadth of markets served, it was critical to bring projects to the forefront of the website and allow users to easily find if Urban Engineers could address their needs through browsing services they are looking for or the market in which they belong.

what we do navigation

Elevated existing content and maximized internal resources

Their team had a wealth of great content that was just out of reach and an extremely creative, talented staff whose work was buried or limited to an internal audience. Through our content strategy process, we were able to pull that content up to the surface and integrate — even showcase it — more seamlessly into the new website.

Provided the ability to compete on a national scale

It was important for Urban Engineers to stand out in a national market while maintaining and displaying their pride and roots in Philadelphia. For a company largely with deep roots the Philadelphia region, the ability to highlight their national reach and the breadth of their work will position them for growth beyond the region.

Demonstrate thought leadership in field

This extremely active, passionate team was already creating great content and think pieces that reflect their leadership and expertise in the engineering field. We elevated this content by providing their team with a blog engine that features more robust design templates and the ability to tag content.

"P’unk Avenue did an excellent job addressing our needs and delivering a website that sets the bar high amongst others in our industry. It was important for our site to be bright and dynamic, while also being accessible and purposeful, and positions us as experts in our field. Using surveys, workshops, and content strategy meetings, P’unk Ave did their due diligence learning about and understanding our brand. Through hard work between their team and our corporate development group, Urban Engineers now has a forward-facing website that I still get positive feedback about almost every week."
— Kenneth R. Fulmer, PE, President and CEO, Urban Engineers, Inc.
ue ipad

 

Our work humanized Urban Engineers through highlighting the breadth and impact of their work, adding clarity to the complexity of their services and markets, and most importantly, celebrating the people who help make our world go around. 

 


Similar Projects
Websites & Apps
Daytona State College
Giving Everyone a Reason To Get a Degree
Websites & Apps
Wissahickon Trails
PUNK Letters
Have a project in mind?
Reach out to us to start a conversation!
hello@punkave.com 215.755.1330
Rachel Emery
Director of Partnerships