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Let's talk about your projectWebsite redesign accelerates transit district's bold rebranding
Summary
JCMTD knew it needed to majorly shift gears to grow its ridership across all demographics. Providing public transportation to Carbondale and surrounding communities in southern Illinois, the municipal corporation had a dated website that did little to communicate its value or energize its constituents. They wanted to elevate public perceptions about mass transit, reframing bus rides as opportunities for everyday adventure by highlighting access to local attractions and connectivity to bustling Chicago, regional hiking destinations, and more. The college student market was of particular interest, as the district had recently taken over the Saluki Express bus routes serving the SIUC campus community. Realizing a brand overhaul was in order, they tapped creative experts at Arthur Agency to develop a fresh, modern visual identity and a punchy new name: JAX.
The challenge: boost public image and ridership with an intuitive, modernized website—on a budget.
JAX’s new identity was everything the old website was not: streamlined. Adventurous. Bold. Fun.
Leveraging these attributes effectively on the website—a primary resource for current and prospective riders—was the critical next step to ensure a smooth ride for the rebrand.
In addition to a complete visual makeover, the site also needed across-the-board back-end upgrades to catch up to modern standards for website accessibility, mobile responsiveness, search engine optimization, security, and ease of maintenance.
And they needed to achieve all of this in a cost-effective way, demonstrating good stewardship of taxpayer dollars.
The solution: condensed discovery and strategic collaboration to bring the new brand online
Working closely with the client and our Arthur Agency colleagues, we adapted our typical website design and development process to fit their budget and timeline through:
- Condensed discovery process: By collaborating with Arthur, we were able to capitalize on the discovery work that had gone into the visual rebranding, allocating our own team’s time and efforts on more focused research and deliverables that would have the biggest impact.
- Strategic third-party partnerships: Instead of relying solely on custom development, we were able to deliver new functionality by integrating carefully vetted third-party solutions including an online payment feature, a virtual support (chat) feature, and live bus route tracking. We also connected the client with a copywriter to support additional content needs within their budget.
The result: a polished new website both affordable and timely—the public transit way.
This highly collaborative engagement was a successful exercise in customization of not just our tech product, but our development process.
With a road-tested condensed discovery now in our toolkit, Pixo is even better equipped to meet clients wherever they are—and map out the best route to achieving their goals.