C.Hardy Aerial Services

TL;DR / Summary.

C. Hardy Aerial Services is a long-established aerial installation business in the Lake District with over 20 years of experience. The client needed a simple, professional online presence that would make it easy for potential customers to find his contact details and request his services, whilst ranking highly on Google for local search terms.

I led the project end-to-end; from competitor research and ethnographic usability testing through persona development, dual-version wireframing, UI design, development, and post-launch performance analysis. A distinctive aspect of this project was designing two versions simultaneously; a minimal launch version and a more content-rich expanded version, both subjected to usability testing to validate the approach.

The minimal version launched successfully, with usability testing returning a 100% success rate across all three key tasks; finding contact details, sending a message, and identifying services and USPs. Post-launch, the site ranks on the first page of Google for both "Aerial Services, Cumbria" and "Aerial Services, Lake District", with heat map analysis confirming strong engagement with the Services section. The expanded version remains planned for a future release.

The Brief.

The client, an aerial installation specialist in the Lake District with over 20 years of experience, approached me to design and build a simple brochure website. His goal was straightforward; establish an online presence where potential customers could easily find his contact details and request his services. Direct, no fuss, and gets the job done effectively, much like the service he provides.

During our initial discussions, a second objective emerged; ranking on the first page of Google for terms such as "aerial services Lake District". With very little content available at the outset, I advised that adding service descriptions and unique selling points would not only help build trust and engagement with potential customers, but directly support his SEO goals. After some deliberation, the client agreed. The final requirements were:

Display contact details prominently
Showcase services
List unique selling points
Rank highly in search results

Whilst the website would be intentionally simple in its output, the design still needed to be clear, usable, and built to stand the test of time. The client had an existing website, originally built in 2012, which relied on Adobe Flash for its hero section; a technology no longer supported by modern browsers, leaving a broken, empty space at the top of the page. The site also lacked mobile optimisation and had a cluttered, dated layout that did little to convey the professionalism and trustworthiness of a specialist with over 20 years of experience. A full redesign was needed; one that addressed the information hierarchy, introduced responsive design for mobile users, and established a professional online presence worthy of the business. Given the client's limited interest in updating the site himself, the design also had to feel current and professional without relying on frequent content refreshes to maintain its effectiveness.

Original design of the client's website

The redesign of the website

Project Planning.

Working alongside the client, I created a project map outlining goals, objectives, and the key decisions needed to move the project forward. This helped clarify roles from the outset; the client would handle written content, reviews, feedback, and any future content updates, whilst I took ownership of the full design and UX process, including competitor analysis, usability testing, user personas, wireframing, user flows, and UI concepts, alongside all assets, development, third-party integrations, testing, and post-launch performance analysis. Wix was agreed upon as the CMS platform for the same reasons as previous projects; my familiarity with it and its suitability for a client with limited technical involvement. Shared responsibilities included defining requirements, web hosting, domain name and package selection, constraints, timescales, and content preparation.

The objective goals were defined across five key areas; contact details covering the type of information required and its placement across the site, showcasing services and USPs with accompanying imagery, the send message functionality including what happened after submission, branding encompassing colour scheme, style guide, imagery, tone of voice, logo, and typeface, and search engine rankings covering SEO implementation across meta information, keywords, content tagging, and image descriptions.

Competitor Research and Analysis.

With the scope and objectives agreed, I researched aerial services businesses in the Lake District, starting with sole traders and gradually casting a wider net to larger companies. Similar types of information appeared consistently across sites (contact details, services, and testimonials) but information hierarchies varied considerably, with no single established model for how content should be structured or presented. Whilst some sites provided clear, easy-to-find information, others felt chaotic and lacked a sense of professionalism and trust. Direct, no-fuss brochure sites were clearly commonplace in this trade, which aligned well with the client's brief and reinforced the importance of getting the fundamentals right.

Whilst best practice could answer some questions about what users expected, I wanted to validate these assumptions with real feedback. I asked a sample of users what information they valued most, observed how they interacted with existing sites, and gathered their feedback on how easy or difficult it was to find pertinent information. These insights would directly inform the usability testing phase that followed.

Usability Testing.

To gather reliable behavioural data, I conducted ethnographic field research with a sample of eight participants, deliberately varied in age, gender, and web browsing proficiency. Rather than watching over their shoulders, I used screen recording software to capture their interactions naturally, reducing the impact of my presence and minimising researcher bias. One by one, I asked each participant to complete a series of tasks on existing competitor sites that reflected the requirements of the brief, vocalising their thought process throughout.

Following the individual sessions, I brought the same participants together as a focus group to explore their experiences in more depth. I mediated the session to keep discussion on topic and reduce the risk of groupthink, asking questions around what they liked, where the pain points were, and what they would change. This combination of observation and discussion allowed me to identify both the explicit and implicit needs of the user.

The data revealed consistent findings across the competitor sites:

Overly long text discouraged reading; users preferred visuals and concise content
Contact details were expected near the top of the page
Service lists were highly valued
FAQs were considered useful but not essential
Testimonials increased trust significantly
Poor information hierarchy made scanning difficult
Dedicated service pages were favoured over cluttered homepages

A particularly valuable insight emerged from the focus group discussions; participants made a clear distinction that aerial services aren't browsed casually but searched for reactively, when something has gone wrong and a specialist is urgently needed. This reinforced the importance of making pertinent information immediately discoverable, ensuring the business conveyed credibility and trustworthiness, and making it as easy as possible to get in touch.

User Personas.

From the research, I developed three personas to represent the range of users likely to visit the site. Steve, a 43-year-old builder from Carlisle, was no-nonsense and time-poor; he wanted clear navigation, minimal text, and quick access to relevant information, with no patience for fancy effects or unnecessary complexity. Ron, a 67-year-old retiree from Windermere, was surprisingly tech-savvy and primarily mobile; he wanted fast-loading, mobile-optimised pages with effective navigation and clear feedback once he'd achieved his goal. Kelly, a 24-year-old new homeowner from Manchester, was cautious and research-driven; having had bad experiences with tradespeople in the past, she wanted testimonials, recognised credentials, and a well-designed site that conveyed legitimacy and trustworthiness before she would consider making contact.

Together these personas directly reinforced the usability testing findings; the need for concise, scannable content for Steve, mobile-first responsive design for Ron, and trust signals including testimonials and credentials for Kelly. A further insight that cut across all three was the role of word of mouth in this trade; people find tradespeople through personal recommendations, and the website needed to extend that sense of trusted endorsement digitally through reviews, credentials, and a professional brand presence.

Wireframing.

With the research data and persona insights in hand, I began drafting preliminary wireframes to define the information hierarchy for the homepage and potential sub-pages. A key early question was what should follow the hero section — the USPs to show personality, or Services to be immediately useful? Drawing on the personas and research findings, a user-centric structure began to take shape, though this would be something worth validating through testing.

A practical challenge emerged early; the client had very little content to provide beyond his logo and basic copy. There was no imagery or media available, which required careful consideration of how to approach the visual design. I also advised that including testimonials and more detailed service descriptions would benefit both SEO and user trust, however the client preferred to launch with a minimal structure focusing only on contact details, services, and USPs. I worked with what was available and produced two wireframe versions for comparative testing.

Version 1 was the minimal launch version, built around the content provided; contact details, services, and USPs, structured to be clean, direct, and immediately useful. Version 2 was an expanded alternative, incorporating testimonials sourced from Yell.com reviews, FAQs, dedicated service pages for Repair, Installation, TV, and Internet, and additional content in the Why C. Hardy section. I also included a Live Chat function in this version to invite real-time contact, however the client declined this in favour of phone and contact form communication. Both versions were designed to the same visual standard and prepared for comparative usability testing, with the intention that positive results from Version 2 would build the case for a future expanded release.

Version 1 of the wireframe

The proposed version 2 of the wireframe

User Flows.

With the client's approval on the proposed structure and information hierarchy, I storyboarded the user flows for both versions. For the launch version, the flows covered three key journeys; finding contact details, showcasing services, and showcasing USPs. For the expanded version, additional flows were mapped for the FAQs section and the dedicated service pages, where I wanted to identify any potential points of divergence as users navigated between the homepage and subsidiary pages.

A key consideration throughout was the CMS environment and its constraints. Whilst this was a relatively simple site and the constraints were minimal compared to more complex projects, they were still carefully considered as a matter of thoroughness and to mitigate any potential risks during development. The goal across both versions was to make every user journey as seamless and intuitive as possible, ensuring that whether a user wanted to find contact details quickly like Steve, navigate on mobile like Ron, or take time to review services and credentials like Kelly, the experience would meet their needs effectively.

Iterative Testing and Validation.

With both wireframe versions ready, I returned to the same sample of eight participants to validate the proposed structures and user flows. Testing was conducted in two stages; first through ethnographic observation where participants completed the same series of tasks as the initial round, vocalising their thought process throughout, and then through one-on-one interviews to explore what they liked, what they didn't, and how easy or difficult they found the key journeys.

The results were extremely encouraging. For the launch version:

100% found contact information within 10 seconds
100% found it easy to send a message
100% were able to identify services and USPs

For the expanded version:

67.5% found the FAQs section useful
87.5% were able to find detailed service information quickly
87.5% felt the testimonials and Yell reviews increased trust and legitimacy

The 100% success rate across all three launch version metrics was particularly pleasing, confirming the structure was intuitive and ready for the UI design phase. The expanded version results were equally positive, strengthening the case for a future release. I shared the findings with the client, who was pleased with the outcomes and happy to proceed to the UI design phase.

Following this, we discussed KPIs to measure the site's success post-launch; subsidiary page click-throughs, number of messages sent via the contact form, and uptake in phone call enquiries. The latter presented a measurement challenge since calls could originate from multiple sources, making attribution difficult. The client agreed to ask new customers whether they had visited the website prior to calling, providing a practical workaround for tracking this KPI without requiring complex analytics infrastructure.

UI Design and Visual Identity.

Working from the client's logo, I derived a colour scheme and primary typeface, pairing it with a complementary secondary typeface to create a clear typographic hierarchy. With no imagery available, I adopted a light, friendly illustrative style, drawing all illustrations from scratch in Adobe Illustrator, which worked harmoniously with the limited content and conveyed approachability and professionalism without relying on photography. Custom icons were created to run consistently throughout the site, and a carefully selected location-based image was used in the Why C. Hardy section to create an immediate geographical association for the client's user base.

The header was designed as a sticky navigation that followed the user as they scrolled, ensuring contact details remained visible at all times. This directly addressed Steve's need for quick access to relevant information and Ron's requirement for effective, always-accessible navigation. The Services section featured a subtle video animation as a background to bring depth to an otherwise static page, with a light red overlay applied to keep the design within the agreed colour scheme.

Accessibility was embedded throughout; colour contrast was validated against the WebAIM contrast checker, font sizes were tested for legibility across screen resolutions including mobile, form fields were clearly labelled, and feedback systems including anchor navigation, CTAs, and form submission messages were implemented to create clear, predictable interactions.

The expanded version introduced additional design considerations. Testimonials sourced from Yell.com were placed prominently on a carousel near the top of the page to evoke trust early in the user journey. A deliberately simple background in the Testimonials and FAQs sections provided visual breathing space between the illustrated hero and the animated Services section, creating rhythm and contrast across the page. The Why C. Hardy section was expanded to include a map highlighting the client's areas of operation, addressing what felt like a thin section in Version 1.

Dedicated service pages such as Television Services maintained the animated background from the Services section as a visual callback to reinforce the branding, and featured the illustrative graphic from the hero to further cement the visual identity across the site. The footer was also significantly expanded to include links to the dedicated service pages, business hours, a review summary from Yell.com, and a VAT registration number; collectively providing users with greater confidence in the legitimacy and professionalism of the business, directly addressing Kelly's need for trust signals and transparency before making contact.

A concise style guide was produced to document the visual language of the site; covering the two typefaces, Futura for headings and Roboto for body copy, with responsive sizing defined across desktop and mobile, the three-colour scheme of white, red, and black with clear usage rules for each, button components in both default and hover states, the custom icon set, and miscellaneous design elements including the star rating system, carousel navigation, and the distinctive wavy title underline used throughout. In retrospect, there is more that could be added to the style guide over time, including spacing, sizing, shadow, and border guidance, to bring it closer to the standard of documentation I would produce today.

Development.

With the UI designs signed off, Version 1 was taken into development as agreed, with Version 2 remaining a thoroughly researched and validated future iteration ready to be built when the client was prepared to supply the additional content.

Following a SWOT analysis of the available CMS templates, I opted for a blank template to build from, as the pre-built options showed too many inconsistencies to justify using them as a starting point for a custom design. Working through the information hierarchy from the header down, I constructed the site section by section, cross-referencing the wireframes and style guide at each stage. The illustrative components required some adjustments in the source files as the CMS automatically scaled images to fill their containers, which needed careful handling to preserve the intended compositions. Subtle content effects were added throughout to enhance engagement without compromising performance.

SEO was implemented as a core part of the build rather than an afterthought; every image was given descriptive alt text incorporating relevant keywords, a clear heading hierarchy was established across H1, H2, and paragraph tags, and meta tags and descriptions were added to support the client's primary objective of ranking highly in local search results.

All functionality was thoroughly tested in a staging environment by both the client and myself, covering links, form submissions, and device compatibility. Both desktop and mobile versions were fully built and tested to ensure the responsive design delivered a consistent experience across devices. No significant issues were encountered and the site was published successfully. I congratulated the client on his new online business presence.

Post-Launch Performance.

Following launch, the client received positive feedback from customers and peers, and confirmed that enquiries had been coming through the contact form and via phone. Measuring the phone call KPI proved challenging as predicted, however the client continued to ask new customers whether they had visited the website prior to calling, providing a practical ongoing measure of the site's influence on new business.

Early KPI insights and heat map analysis revealed encouraging patterns. The Services section attracted the highest engagement on the page, confirming that users were actively seeking information about what the client offered. The Contact navigation link saw lower interaction than expected, though this was attributed to the contact details being prominently displayed in the sticky header throughout the user's journey, making the dedicated Contact section somewhat redundant. A particularly useful finding was that users were attempting to click the service summaries, expecting to be taken to more detailed information. This directly validated the case for Version 2's dedicated service pages and reinforced the value of the expanded version as a future release.

Beyond the heat map, site speed was also reviewed. The CMS reported the site as performing well, though further optimisation through image compression remained a potential improvement for a future update.

The client was pleased to find that the site ranks on the first page of Google for both "Aerial Services, Cumbria" and "Aerial Services, Lake District", confirming that the SEO foundations put in place at launch had delivered on one of the project's primary objectives.
Had I been able to continue the iterative improvement cycle, the next phase would have focused on:

A/B testing between Version 1 and Version 2 to measure the impact of the expanded content on user engagement and conversion
Testing whether the illustrative style or real photography of the client's work builds greater trust amongst users, particularly for cautious users like Kelly
Further image compression and site speed optimisation
Integration of Yell.com reviews via a third-party plugin, pending research into compatible CMS applications

Version 2 remains a thoroughly validated and design-ready iteration. The research, testing, and UI work completed provide a strong foundation for implementation whenever the client is ready to take the next step.

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