99designs Homepage Redesign Contest

99designs

99designs, the largest online marketplace for crowdsourced graphic design services, enables businesses to source custom logo design, web design, t-shirt design, print design and other graphic design work quickly and affordably by launching design projects to a global community of more than 150,000 designers in 192 countries.

Every week more than 1,200 new design contests are launched allowing designers to showcase their talents on a level playing field while creating the opportunity to reach clients they would not have otherwise been exposed to. Approximately 40% of the projects lead to additional direct work making 99designs a powerful tool for making money and building client relationships.

http://99designs.com

airbnb.com
etsy.com
mailchimp.com
dribbble.com

Welcome to the 99designs homepage redesign contest!
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We are looking to bring a fresh perspective to our homepage: http://99designs.com
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We are open to ALL ideas!
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You can take an evolutionary approach by making small improvements to what’s already there... OR you can make big sweeping changes and take us in a whole new direction. :)
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Either way there are some important things to consider:
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1. It’s important the new homepage fits in with the rest of our existing site - it should be simple, creative and fun.
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2. We serve TWO distinct audiences (clients & designers). We currently focus our homepage more on the client side, which is important for selling contests. However, we are open to designs that explore highlighting the design community more while retaining the primary goal of selling design contests.
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3. Our current homepage is set up like a landing page, meaning it is optimized to focus customers into a sales funnel. Clearly the sales funnel is important. That said, we are open to explore designs that provide more of an overview of how the site works, with graphic design project examples right up front..
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4. Logo and Web design are our two biggest categories. We also offer a variety of other graphic design categories, many of which you will see on our current homepage.
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5. The new page should include:
- Our phone number
- A link to “Request a design consultation”
- Links to our product pages (logo design, website design, business card design etc...)
- Our footer (can be redesigned)
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6. We have found the following elements useful so you may want to include them and we are open to seeing designs without them as well:
- Logos for the prominent media coverage (New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Entrepreneur, Tech Crunch, Forbes)
- Site statistics (i.e. number of designs per contest, number of open contests, and so on)
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7. We are open to calling more attention to our social channels (blogs, Facebook, Twitter)
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8. We are open to designs that DO and DO NOT include the video.
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9. Ultimately we would like our site to be responsive so the content displayed adjusts automatically depending on the screen size of the device being used to view it. Bonus points for designs that conform to a "responsive design" framework :)
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Go wild and have fun!

You can download our logo here:
http://99designs.com/branding
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Designs will be judged on the following criteria:
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1. Usability - how easy, intuitive and enjoyable it is to navigate the page and consume information
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2. Visual appeal - the overall attractiveness of the page
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3. Clarity and balance - how well the page strikes a balance between our two distinct audiences (clients and designers) so that each immediately understands why the site is relevant to them and the other
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4. Personality fit - the degree to which the page fits with the existing site and the overall personality of 99designs
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About the 99designs Homepage Redesign Contest
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The 99designs Homepage Redesign Contest runs from April 23 to May 14. Submissions will be judged by 99designs staff and a panel of industry experts including Joe Gebbia, co-founder and CPO of Airbnb; Eric Ries, author of the bestselling book “The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses” and the blog “Startup Lessons Learned”; Arem Duplessis, Design Director for The New York Times Magazines; and Mark Harbottle, serial entrepreneur and co-founder of 99designs, Flippa, and SitePoint. 99designs will choose up to three winning homepage designs, and will award a $1,000 cash prize to each winning designer. Following the contest, 99designs will test the homepage designs using its internal testing methodologies, and will incorporate winning elements into the next version of its homepage.