British Council
CX Strategy & Design for the UK's international organisation dedicated to educational opportunities and cultural relations.
Our client, the British Council, needed a modern, responsive website to promote their English language tests effectively. Our team helped by developing a comprehensive CX strategy and design, including UX/UI enhancements. Computools assisted in revitalising and optimising the platform, which resulted in a user-friendly, efficient website that improved user engagement and increased test registrations.
The client is a prominent organisation that aims to promote British culture and values globally. With a reach that extends to over 100 countries, they reach 650 million people each year. Employing a workforce of more than 7,000 dedicated full-time employees, this organisation is committed to fostering cultural exchange, educational opportunities, and intercultural relations.
The British Council wanted a modern, responsive design and improved user experience. Also, they needed to consolidate resources for the IELTS English proficiency test. The presence of unofficial test materials negatively impacted their brand reputation, prompting the need for a strategic approach to resource consolidation.
Additionally, the lack of clear guidance for test preparation, progress tracking, and readiness was a concern. The client recognised the need for a user-friendly, structured solution to streamline the test preparation process.
Computools undertook a digital transformation project to revitalise and optimise the website. The solution included user research to understand user needs, service design to enhance user experience, portal development for content delivery, website hosting set-up, and analytics integration. The result was a responsive, user-friendly platform that met the British Council’s branding requirements and significantly increased revenue, user throughput, and process automation.
Our primary mission was to provide candidates with a streamlined and structured pathway for test preparation, offering essential resources such as PDF files and webinar videos. We established a user-friendly WordPress platform as the host to facilitate easy access to educational materials, simplifying navigation and accessibility for candidates. Additionally, we implemented critical search engine optimisation (SEO) techniques to enhance the portal’s visibility and accessibility, ensuring it reached wider audience.
We integrated comprehensive user analytics into the platform, generating in-depth reports that provided valuable insights into user behaviour and preferences, helping to refine the user experience. We also implemented an email notification system to enhance communication with users, ensuring they received important updates and information promptly.
Our overarching goal was to simplify and improve the test preparation process, offering a valuable resource for candidates. This project underscored the client’s commitment to educational excellence and our dedication in helping them succeed in their mission.
As a result of this project, the client successfully launched a web portal that simplified IELTS test preparation. We optimised landing pages, implemented SEO strategies, and enhanced resource editing, and now this portal offers essential educational resources. The impact is notable, with a significant 42% increase in the number of tests administered globally in 2022, as compared with 2018.
Computools was selected as the ideal partner for this project for several reasons:
The client’s journey to find the right partner for their project was a careful and detailed process. They considered several options but chose Computools for a few key reasons.
They liked that we know their industry inside and out. We have a strong track record of delivering high-quality digital solutions and meeting deadlines. Plus, our experience working globally matched their international reach. In the end, they chose us because they believed in our expertise and our ability to get the job done well and on time. Our partnership is built on a shared commitment to getting great results for their business.
We remain available to address post-launch enquiries, issues or enhancements. We conduct regular maintenance and updates to keep the product running smoothly, correct potential issues, and introduce new features as needed. We continuously apply data analytics to gain insights into user behaviour, pinpoint areas for improvement, and tailor the product to user preferences. We focus on security measures with ongoing monitoring and updates to safeguard user data and maintain the product’s integrity.
We integrated comprehensive user analytics into the platform, allowing for the generation of detailed reports. These reports offered valuable insights into user behaviour, which helped us refine and enhance user experience continuously.
These design challenges were important components of the project and contributed to the successful development and implementation of the English test preparation web portal.
Creating profiles of typical users for design reference.
Structuring pages and content for logical navigation.
Drafting blueprints for interface layout and interaction.
Designing the visual elements for user interaction.
WordPress
WordPress is one of the world's most popular content management systems. With its help, you can create and manage sites of various kinds without knowledge or engineering skills. It allows you to create and publish entries, place widgets, change the design, arrange, and display various elements, etc.
Scrum is a management framework where one or more cross-functional, self-organised teams create a product in stages.
First, we worked on preparing the website design, initial DevOps, and business analysis, and then we gradually moved into the WordPress development and quality assurance stages.
"Computools was selected through an RFP process. They were shortlisted and selected from between 5 other suppliers. Computools has worked thoroughly and timely to solve all security issues and launch as agreed. Their expertise is impressive."
"Computools was selected through an RFP process. They were shortlisted and selected from between 5 other suppliers. Computools has worked thoroughly and timely to solve all security issues and launch as agreed. Their expertise is impressive."
Global Web Officer at British Council
The Computools team was very rapidely operational despite the complexity of the situation and the need for the team to adapt to our development methodologies. The Computools team could also work very remotely with very good inter-communication with the SBFinance team ensuring good efficiency despite off-shoring.
Computools are experts and act professionally, with lots of guidance on technical recommendations and with easy to understand explanations of what the technical choices mean and why one can be a better website than another. As a result, the development was completed on time and exceeded our expectations. The feedback from our customers was very positive and compared to our previous results we doubled our turnover.
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Computools was selected through an RFP process. They were shortlisted and selected from between 5 other suppliers. Computools has worked thoroughly and timely to solve all security issues and launch as agreed. Their expertise is impressive.