St. Joseph Educational Ministries

Website project

Website content strategy
Brand extension for web
Web design & development

About the organization

St. Joseph Educational Ministries (SJEM) is an innovative organization that works as a bridge between its sponsored educational institutions and the Catholic Church. They provide education and information for the leadership of the schools they sponsor, helping to carry on the schools’ legacies and foundational beliefs.

Project to-do list

Strategize a new standalone home on the web for SJEM to start off on the right foot, clarifying who they are and what they offer
Enable the sharing of the ministry’s engaging content in a user-friendly, accessible site
Design a visual brand for the website that extends SJEM’s new logo and that the organization feels well represented by
Ensure that administrative staff will be able to update the site themselves and manage its content easily
Ensure that a variety of audiences is served by the site content, including internal audiences (institutions, boards, etc.) and external folks
Inspire and inform the broader community, including the general public, potential member organizations, and peers with similar goals or situations to SJEM

Project milestone

Content strategy foundations

Since St. Joseph Educational Ministries is a new organization (and the first of its kind), our web project team spent intentional time thinking through the content strategy foundations. Together, we clarified potential audiences, what types of content the site needed to accommodate, and the mood or feeling that should be conveyed to site visitors. We identified that the site needed to present SJEM as the perfect balance of cutting-edge and trustworthy, evolving and experienced, grounded and future-thinking.

Project milestone

Site architecture

After clarifying our website needs and goals together, we created a working list of content needed on the new site and strategized the perfect site architecture to hold it all. We created a hierarchy of needed pages, grouping things in an understandable way for external audiences. And we defined clear categories and tags for post content, so that the posts could appear dynamically in feeds throughout the site when relevant.

color palette of greens, blues, and yellows — The new extended color palette allows for more nuanced site design — and it can easily be accessed & used by site editors as well in the backend of the site.

Project milestone

Brand extension

We completed a full brand extension for the site, where we extended their logo to a complete web identity, with a beautiful color palette that included necessary neutrals as well as colors that meet web accessibility color contrast standards. And we prioritized legible web typography, pairing the typeface in the logo with a nicely readable serif font.

Project milestone

Site design & development

From the ground up, we developed a brand new welcoming website that provides informational pages as well as integrated update posts. Post feeds scattered throughout the site give additional access to these updates, narrowed down to content that is relevant for the current page.

We designed the site to be bright, friendly and engaging. This strong and accessible website foundation will enable SJEM to accommodate new content, new sponsored schools, or new initiatives well into the future.

View Site

Screenshot of SJEM home page — The final website showcases the extended palette, slanted design elements that mimic the logo shapes, and dynamic feeds full of useful information.

Screenshot of individual update post — This individual post can include author information, in-copy links to external content, and clear tagging to link it to its related member institution.

Spotlight on

Individual updates

Sometimes SJEM has content to post that is created by them, but often they are uplifting and sharing content created by their member institutions. We designed each update post to be welcoming and super-readable. Author information gives context for who the post is coming from, and well-organized taxonomies (like categories and posts) make sure that everything is labeled clearly. These tags and categories also enable the site to automatically include this content in the context-relevant dynamic feeds throughout.

Spotlight on

Member content

Though the bulk of the site’s information is for anyone to read and written for the public, a few pages contain useful information for SJEM sponsored partners (including board members, school leadership, etc.).

We created a helpful utility menu navigation in the top right corner of the site to direct these internal people to the “hub” pages created for them. By providing easy access to these pages without cluttering up the primary main menu, we’re keeping these members happy without confusing the majority of the site’s visitors.

Detail screenshot of the utility menu item specifically for sponsored partners. — This screenshot shows the utility menu drop-down for sponsored partners, providing easy access to their “hub” pages.

“Blustery Day Design far exceeded any expectations that I could have had. Not coming from the communications or marketing field, my colleagues and I learned a great deal about the development and design process, and maintenance of a successful site. Blustery Day Design empowers their clients to be learners and doers in their own journey. I feel confident and excited for the future of our website as it continues to play a crucial role in the success of our organization.”
Cara McMahon
Executive Director, St. Joseph Educational Ministries