Sunset a website in 4 weeks, meeting the needs of diverse audiences

Revisiting fundamental design principles while incorporating user and stakeholder feedback to create a more engaging experience for Apple engineers

Year
2022

Full-Time
4 weeks

Team
1 Client Product Manager
1 Design Director
1 Lead Product Designer (ME!)

Methodologies
Human Centered Design
Stakeholder Interviews
Qualitative & Quantitative Analysis
User Interface Design

Tools & Frameworks
Figma
Miro
Human Interface Guidelines

Content and visual hierarchy, along with color and contrast

Best practices for proximity, spacing, size, and scale

Familiar patterns and components

Introduced SF Symbols to enhance consistency and convey content effectively
Integrated system-defined components

Outcomes

Problem

Apple software engineers weren’t engaging with the site as a resource, and Nexus, an Apple partner, was dissatisfied with the website. This hesitation led to reluctance in sunsetting the current site and migrating there data to Apple Cloud Services.

Solution

We identified opportunities to improve content and visual hierarchy to better serve both types of users. Additionally, we focused on introducing consistency and cohesion between this website and other Apple websites.

Key Responsibilities

Qualitative & Quantitative Analysis: Gathered feedback and requirements from users and stakeholders, and evaluated user engagement data.

Reviewed Previous Designs: Analyzing existing design work to understand what wasn't working and what was.
UI Design: Creating the redesigned experience in Figma following Human Interface Guidelines

QUALITATIVE & QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS

Areas of Opportunity

Apple Cloud Services is an internal platform for Apple engineers to explore products and access technical documentation. However, low engagement and dissatisfaction from a key partner, Nexus, signaled deeper usability issues. With just four weeks to sunset the legacy Nexus site and migrate data, our team at Big Nerd Ranch was brought in to redesign the experience.

Our focus: Apply core design principles, address user and stakeholder feedback, and create a more consistent, intuitive experience aligned with Apple’s broader ecosystem.

Successfully sunsetting the Nexus website in only 4 weeks

Meeting the needs of multiple audiences

REVIEWED PREVIOUS DESIGNS

Discovered

It didn’t feel anything like any other internal or external Apple branded product.

Back to Basics

UX/UI DESIGN