Socialsuite

Overview

Socialsuite is a global leader in ESG and impact measurement software, serving 150+ organizations worldwide, from nonprofits like YMCA and Habitat for Humanity to publicly traded companies on NASDAQ and NYSE.

They came to me with a logo and a set of suggested brand colors. Everything else, the visual language, the photography approach, the typography, and its primary digital application, I designed from there.

The Challenge

Their website didn't match their market position: outdated visuals, a confusing experience, and a homepage conversion rate of 2.15%. The goal was ambitious: double conversions to 4.5% without sacrificing lead quality.

Original Homepage Design

Inconsistent Messaging & Layout

The Core Insight

The real problem wasn't design, it was clarity. One message can't resonate with both audiences. The brand needed to feel like two experiences in one: unified by visual language, differentiated by intent.

I mapped each journey separately: a nonprofit program director and a Fortune 500 sustainability officer have completely different pain points, vocabularies, and trust signals. That shaped everything downstream, from navigation structure to imagery to CTA placement. Rather than designing two sites or splitting the brand, I designed one language that shifts register through tone, imagery, and hierarchy. The brand stays unified; the conversation doesn't.

Structure First

I wireframed the core templates with the Socialsuite team to map user flows and content hierarchy, solving the structural problems before layering on brand. The homepage had to route two audiences to relevant content fast; industry pages had to speak directly to sector needs. The wireframes became the alignment tool for stakeholder buy-in before committing to pixels.

Homepage Wireframe

Industry Page Wireframe

Visual Direction

With structure locked, I tested three directions for how the brand could feel:

Direction A

Energetic & Bold

Yellow-gold with teal accents: energy and optimism, but risked feeling too playful for enterprise.

Direction B

Premium & Confident

A deep ocean-to-teal gradient anchored by the brand's circular motifs. Enterprise credibility without feeling cold.

Direction C

Clear & Minimal

A clean, light background letting product UI and brand shapes lead. The most restrained option.

The Brand Language

Color

A two-tier palette: primary tones that carry the brand's weight, and a secondary set that lets the language shift register, warmer for nonprofit contexts, more restrained for enterprise.

Primary Colors

Secondary Palette

Deep Water Gradient

The ocean-to-lagoon gradient became the brand's signature surface, used in hero moments and key brand statements. It's the single most identifiable element of the brand's digital expression.

Typography

Circles as the Visual Alphabet

The logo is built from overlapping circles. The strongest move in the project was extending that geometry into a complete visual language rather than treating the logo as an isolated mark: concentric circles, overlapping shapes, photo frames, section dividers. The circle became the brand's atomic unit, a signature shape language that didn't need illustration to feel distinctive.

Photography as the Anti-SaaS Move

SaaS brands default to abstract illustration. When the team decided against illustrations, I proposed the opposite: real people in black-and-white, framed in the brand's circular geometry with subtle color overlays. A human register essential for the nonprofit audience, distinctive enough to carry enterprise credibility. One treatment, two audiences.

Icons

The Phosphor library in duotone style: a comprehensive set carrying the brand's aesthetic across website, product interface, and marketing materials.

Designing for Conversion

The original demo form asked for everything upfront, friction that was costing real conversions against the 4.5% target. I redesigned it with progressive disclosure: start simple, reveal complexity only when needed. Perceived effort dropped while lead quality held for the sales team.

Redesigned Demo Form, Progressive Disclosure in Practice

The Final Brand

Outcome

The visual language has since been adopted across Socialsuite's product interface, sales materials, and investor presentations, outliving the website engagement as the company's working brand system.

Reflection

Socialsuite is the project where I learned how much of brand design happens after the logo.

A logo and a color palette aren't a brand. They're the starting ingredients. The brand is everything that happens next: the shape language, the photography system, the gradient logic, the way typography behaves, the decisions about what the brand chooses not to do. That gap, between a brand's ingredients and a brand that actually works across every surface it needs to, is where I do my best work.