The Nerdery — Web Design Done Right
Unzipped Ideas blog
It's not too often where you see a website / blog catch your eye. It's also not too often that you actually enjoy the visuals of the website AND like the content of the website. The Nerdery has managed to do both. They are a web design / development company that I recently ran into as I was looking for a Magento developer. Trust me when I say that I have seen over a thousand web design company websites in the past year including my ownchicago based web development company which is a small side venture for me.
Here is what I like about the nerdery web presence the most:
- It's visually appealing
- It has a LOT of great and creative content, but doesn't clutter up the page
- Their web presence truly shows they really are nerds. I mean, hardcore nerds nerds.
- I actually spent over 10 mins on the website because 1) I was jealous mine didn't look like it and 2) Refer to 1.
- They don't just show their portfolio. They give details about the project including how many hours they worked on it, who worked on it AND how many hours each designer / developer / PM spent on it. I go into further detail about this after the jump.
I picked a random portfolio item that they displayed: http://nerdery.com/projects/izzys-ice-cream
Let's take this page, and dive into it to see what they have on it.
Top Section
- Clean & Minimal logo directly centered with three links to the left & three links to the right
- Our Work has a yellow dot above it to signify where the user is on the page.
- The title of the portfolio page is right there for the user to see and tells the user exactly what the page is about.
- The other links that are not relevant to the active navigation, but are perfect getting views to other things such as "The Web Challenge"
- SEO friendly URL's, and perfect title tags.
- Overall, the consistency and perfection of this top section gives a hint of how the rest of the page is going to go
Middle Section
- A nice big screenshot of the website they designed. An actual screenshot, and not just a logo like many other websites have.
- A sub description to the left of the screenshot that describes exactly what the project was about. No thrills, no extra information. Just a quick summary of what the project was about
- Technologies. This is true nerdery right here. Not everyone cares, but I sure want to know what technologies were involved in it.
- View the site. You mean, they provide you with a link to the direct site? Not just a screenshot of what they did, and leave the rest up to your imagination? You would think this is common practice, but it is far from it. They WANT to show you what they did. And I think that shows a lot.
- More on our blog. Perfect. They enjoyed the project so much, they blogged about it. One page wasn't enough. Again, this just shows they are proud of the work that they do.
- Overall, consistency is key and they maintain consistency with fonts, colors,etc.
Middle - Bottom Section
- Another more detailed description on the left. This time they really dive into the details of not only what they did, but the effect it has on their business. That's key and so important. They just don't talk about their technology, or how pretty it works - but they talk about what it means to the business, and how it affects their business. Another insight into the project
- Project Effort (hours) - First time I've ever seen this. They tell you exactly how many hours it took them to build this project. This is really unheard of, and it really sticks out.
- Project Timeline. Same with hours - I'm assuming this is ACTUAL hours and not estimated because we know how different those two numbers can be. I wish they put if the project was on time & on budget. That's TMI, but hey - They went this far! If 37 signals openly released their satisfaction numbers, then maybe the Nerdery can think about doing the same thing!??
- Project team. They didn't have to do this. But, they did. See that little periodic chart with some of the boxes filled with yellow? Those are actual links to their profiles. Each square representing one employee in the company, and the yellow filled ones are links to the profiles who worked on this project. This is what I really enjoy about this site. It's the little details. Now granted, most people won't see this little section. I think it goes along with consistency of the site. It just fits
- The bar charts. Again, another extension to the creativity, details and Openness of the Nerdery.
- Client testimonial. Textbook execution. The client liked it, so lets show it off. I noticed that all of the profile pages have them, but when there is no customer testimonial - they put a developer comment there. Consistency is key while being business savvy.
Bottom Section
- News Ticker. A news ticker via a typewriter. A news ticker that also categories what kind of ticker item it is (blog, news or tweet). Again with the details. You can't see from the screenshot, but it's a moving typewriter. Clean, minimal and to the point AND web standards compliant!
- A call to action. Yes, it's at the bottom. But, at least they have one.
- Footer. Nothing amazing about the footer but ends the page well. I actually do have a complaint about the footer. It says © 2009 The Nerdery. It's 2011. Here's a little tip: <?php echo date("Y"); ?>.
That ends my review of nerdery.com. Believe it or not, I do not work for Nerdery and I am perfectly happy with the current position I am in. I just like to write about good things when I see them.
Media Contact
Mark Malmberg
Communications Manager
Office: (952) 948.1211 x1069
Cell: (612) 850.3178
