Tired of the same old, same old? Me, too.

Mary Adkins is a 3x published author and book writing coach who supports aspiring writers to finally get their books done.

Project details: New brand identity, custom 7-page website, and complete redesign of her high-end group coaching program website.

Timeline: 9+ weeks

Platform: Squarespace 7.1

Lines of code: 3,000+

See Mary's website

inspiration Mood board

Mary came to me with an existing website that was vibrant and full of bold, neon colours, which she didn’t hate (keep scrolling to see the before). However, for her new direction and recent high-end offerings, she wanted it to feel calmer and to build trust faster for an ideal client with more life experience than the average beginner author.

I made sure to include a grounding, trustworthy colour like navy, but added in unexpected pops of mustard and bright poppy red.

This is how she wanted her ideal client to feel when they visited her new website:

Joyful | Inspired | Confident | Action-taking | Trust

Final Colour Palette

Website goals:

Reduce the attention on Mary herself (while still proving she’s an expert with her own published books), and grow confidence from the start in her team members.
Increase the calls-to-action to apply to her online group coaching program ‘The Book Incubator’.
Showcase the testimonials for her program in a bigger way to create trust faster and drive applications.

Custom features used on this site:

Testimonials

Testimonial carousel

Mary’s testimonials are fairly long, so I custom coded entire sections with a bright pink background to showcase them. Images were changed to black and white to not draw too much attention from the amazing feedback from current and past program members!

Multiple calls-to-action

All roads on Mary’s new website lead to her group program in one way or another. Whether it’s her automated webinar funnel, the program application page, or a 1-1 call with her team, she’s got a call-to-action for every type of person.

Hidden books sections

Instead of the typical design of alternating images and text on the left and right side (which is super common in Squarespace - and can make pages feel very long to read), Mary’s books are shown in a custom coded section which reveals the cover image, buy now button, and praise for each book when the title is clicked on.

Auto-rotating image carousel

To edify Mary’s amazing team members and mentors in The Book Incubator, and not place so much focus on Mary herself, an auto-rotating carousel was custom coded to show the most recognizable book covers her team has edited.

Scrolling marquee

To pull focus from the longer copy, moving animations were added in the form of custom marquees. This also signals to website visitors that Mary isn’t the same as a formal, stuffy MFA program, which a good proportion of her current program members have invested in.

Handwritten touches

Again, to pull focus from the longer conversion copy, handwritten touches were added with custom code. This also reminds website visitors of marking up and editing a book manuscript, which adds to the overall bespoke feeling and personalized feedback they’ll receive in The Book Incubator program.