University of Auckland
2019-2020
Summary
While serving as President of the Auckland University Kitesurf Club, I designed and built a new website to help students discover the club, sign up, and book gear with ease. I mapped key user flows for our core audiences — from first-time kiters to returning members — to ensure the site was intuitive and useful. Using Wix, I rapidly prototyped and launched the platform. The result? A seamless onboarding experience, glowing feedback, and a 135% boost in membership the following year.
Role
Product Design and Implementation
Team
Myself and I
Problem
The kite club didn’t have a place for potential members and existing members to learn about the club and to hire gear.
Kitesurfing is a bit daunting and very hard to get involved in without support or lots of money. I decided to try my part in breaking down the barriers to entry and make it super easy for people to learn about the club and where to go kitesurfing safely.
So… who are the users?
We have three primary personas and their main desires.
New student / Potential member
What is the kite club?
Why should I join?
How do I sign up?
New member
How do I learn?
And where?
Beginner kiter
How do I hire gear?
Where can I safely go kiting?
What is the wind doing?
The process
What was the landing page going to accomplish?
So for our landing page we want our top selling points for our potential members.
Why you should join
It's cheaper to learn if you join
It's even cheaper to hire gear if you join
And an emphasis on how fun the club is
What would the user do next?
Our nav bar needed to be in an order that made sense. After being on the landing page what would be the most important thing?
I decided to lay it out in the order one would progress through the club.
They've just signed up so now they need lessons. After lessons they would be interested in hiring gear and getting out there!
But how do they know where to go?
This was one of the biggest pain points of a new kitesurfer. There are quite a few things to take into consideration when deciding where to go kiting and it's even harder if you didn't grow up sailing and don't know how to read the wind or the tide.
These are the steps in simple
What is the wind doing?
What beach can I go to with this wind direction?
What tide is best at that beach and any other information (beginner friendly etc)
These are some early sketches
And the following shows the first iteration on Squarespace and then the final result with the new branding on Wix.
Solution
Fully fledged website with new branding for the club on Wix
A booking system using an online platform for the club to simply booking of kite equipment
Impact
We saw an increase in membership of 135% 153 (2019) -> 207 (2020)
Also saw many a message complimenting the website through our club's Facebook
What did I learn?
My domain knowledge really helped the process
Learned to work with the limitations of Wix and the map integrations
What would I do in the future?
Integrate a live wind forecast
Further validation on the design and information shown on new/potential members and those without domain knowledge.