The traditional path for startup brands has always been: invent a product, make it, test it out, then unleash it upon the unsuspecting public in the hope that if their enthusiasm is but 5% of yours, then it should begin to take off - with a little help from the odd influencer and paid ads.
Eventually, if things go well, you build an audience and have a platform to evolve and develop the brand and try out new products. It's about trust, which, much like with people in life, takes time to build and can be expensive. But there's no rule to say that is how brand building must be done. Wild Elements embarked on nurturing an engaged audience, even in the absence of tangible products. Through a blend of blog content, social media, and a unique "by us, for us" ethos. This approach kindled a devoted following, creating an atmosphere of devotion and inclusion among patrons. The brand metamorphosed into a lifestyle and a community people yearned to join.
Every month, they sent out their informative newsletter linking to their blog which is loaded with useful stories, hints, and tips for living a better, healthier life - both for you and the planet. On top of that, they have a fairly sizeable give-back scheme whereby they contribute to and support planet-protecting organizations. Wise and forward-thinking, it's that kindness of heart we'd love to see more of from brands.
So when they came to us to discuss launching their first range of products, which ties back to the ethos of everything they'd been doing, we were excited to be part of it.
Wild Elements
Design / Shopify Plus / User Experience
We Let an Environmentally Focussed Beauty Brand into the Wild...
Wild Element’s unique startup approach cultivated engagement through newsletters, blogs, and giving back. Their debut product line, aligned with values, led to a whole brand evolution. From a refreshed identity to a custom Shopify Plus ecommerce website, each move echoed their caring mission – a testament that authenticity truly connects.
The inaugural collection consisted of six products in total, underscoring a commitment to excellence rather than quantity. They introduced the innovative notion of IN and ON bodycare, a fusion of products meant for both internal (nutritional supplements) and external (skin moisturizers) application. While the idea may appear familiar, the true enchantment lies in the extraordinary ingredients encapsulated within these products. Every ingredient is either organically cultivated using cutting-edge sustainable farming techniques or responsibly sourced from local suppliers.
Our brief was to evolve the current brand identity, which was developed primarily for a blog/newsletter to work across digital and ecommerce, design the website, and then launch everything on a new custom Shopify Plus store. It was crucial that not only did this site do the job of selling products, but it was also imperative that it continued the work that had been done before it - which is to continue feeding the customer great content within the blog section and weaving that information into the shopping experience.
Our journey took us through a number of iterations, and eventually, the old adage of Keep It Simple worked best.
Our first task was to look at developing the current brand identity. When it was first created, it was done with a specific audience in mind and relatively quickly. It was bright, bold, and full of life. As they evolved, they wanted to retain this energy but reduce the colors and fonts for a more mature look that retained familiarity with their fans while maintaining credibility with those new to Wild Elements.
Our journey took us through a number of iterations, and eventually, the old adage of Keep It Simple worked best. The original hallmark vivid orange shade remained, but we reduced down other colors and created a new, modern, and flexible type system. Next, we set about developing everything to work across all platforms.
Wild Elements images are easily identifiable. They continued the high contrast, high saturation, and high energy they always had, so we wanted to ensure that the images were the site's main focus. We made images large, and in order to ensure ADA compliance throughout, we worked diligently to ensure typography predominantly didn't obscure any imagery or, at least, was still legible, achieved by oversizing everything - which in itself formed part of the new look.
Naturally, with a topic such as this, there's a lot of information to convey, so the challenge was how to do that - engaging new and old audiences alike in the brand's mission. We created playful, engaging content blocks inspired by children's books. We used alphabet style cards: "F is for... Fermentation"; when you mouse over, it flips to reveal snippets of information - these are to be dotted around the site at various intervals.
Elsewhere, we structured the main product pages to pull out key information relating to ingredients, blowing up the content way beyond the traditional accordion interface and adding splashes of color and images to these.
We knew the audience are predominantly mobile users, so we paid special attention to getting the site to run lightning fast. This was achieved largely through what our tech director Aaron refers to as "No frills" development, not as restrictive as it sounds - what it actually means is the use of javascript and heavier coding practices were reduced as a trade-off for speed - and it works. The site achieves a speed score of 90 (Google ranks 100 as perfect), and Aaron says the site is "fast as f**k"...
Elsewhere, we used a lot of meta objects to control ingredient libraries, sustainability rules, and all the info on the PDP relating to clinical trials and regimens. Speaking of which, special mention goes to them. We extracted this info from the traditional accordion/tab system to make the pages more engaging and colorful. We staggered them down the page alongside oversized numbers and bold background colors.
Finally, we partnered with and hooked into the ingredient sourcing app 'Provenance' to provide additional information on the origin of the ingredients in the products. It provides independent authenticity around the product's vegan, sustainable, and packaging credentials.
