jyzdesign, Author at JYZ Design

Mple Travel Website

Our team recently completed a modern new website for Mple Travel, a personal travel concierge offering curated and customized vacations.

We have extensive experience developing websites for the travel and tourism industry and pulled some tried and true tricks out of our toolkit. The revamped website combines elevated branding with trendy and modern graphic design, perfectly aligned with the preferences of today’s globetrotters.

Efficient Browsing

We employed a combination of visually engaging icons, well-structured columns, and skimmable layouts. This approach lets travellers quickly grasp the benefits and advantages of choosing Mple Travel as their ultimate travel companion.

Bold, summarizing titles and concise copy convey the benefit of using Mple Travel – highlighting “the problem,” “the value,” and “the solution.”

Additionally, we highlighted their specific offerings through graphics and icons, which work to enhance their unique selling propositions (USPs) and ensure clarity for visitors. Services like helping with accommodations, flights, health insurance, travel documents, and much more were portrayed via these easy-to-skim visuals.

Adventurous Aesthetic

In an effort to evoke inspiration and wanderlust, we consciously avoided the use of stock photos and instead integrated high-quality travel photography. Each scroll through the site immerses visitors in stunning visuals, igniting their desire to embark on new adventures.

We also knew that travel customers tend to shop around and that price is often a critical factor. So, we made sure to place them front and center on the homepage, clearly listing prices alongside a clear call to action.

Furthermore, JYZ Design seamlessly integrated Mple Travel’s internal content management system (CMS) via a convenient form. This integration streamlines the booking process and empowers users to effortlessly communicate their travel preferences and requirements.

We are happy to have had the opportunity to partner with Mple Travel and create another stunning travel hub, inspiring travellers to tick another item off their bucket list one booking at a time.

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Top 10 Website Trends for 2023

The internet is inherently ever-changing, and as we move into the new year, these are the top 10 website trends for 2023. We can expect to see several new design trends that will reshape the way websites look and function. For us as Calgary web designers, identifying trends like these is an important way to ensure we can provide the expertise that keeps your business relevant and contemporary.

Pomeroy Inn & Suites

Pomeroy Inn and Suites have properties across Alberta and British Columbia, operating in rural areas with Western Canadian hospitality. Their family-oriented hotel brand spans generations, with their first hotel opening in Fort St. John in 1941. Since 2010, Pomeroy Lodging has also operated its proprietary brand: Pomeroy Inn & Suites.

With a strong family legacy and deep community roots, the Pomeroy Inn & Suites website needed to be reflective of these qualities while offering optimal functionality for real people: families, rural travellers, long-haul workers and more. The entire website design was created for optional UX functionality – with choices including a floating menu bar, location-specific buttons and an interactive map listing each location.

Branded Visuals

We embodied their slogan of “Building Communities With the Western Spirit” with visuals that portray a community-first approach. We used photos of families, memorable seasonal experiences and– of course– dogs, to illustrate that they’re enthusiastically welcome. We chose to highlight the legacy and history of the Pomeroy brand through a timeline reminiscent of a family tree that allows visitors to visualize the company’s history.

All of these design choices work together to create a cohesive web experience that leaves visitors feeling welcome and like the Pomeroy brand understands their needs as a traveller.

Booking Widget

At its core, the main functionality of a hotel’s website is the customer’s ability to book a room. We created a custom HTML/ CSS for their existing booking widget designed to offer both customers and Pomeroy Lodging a seamless experience – with clear calls-to-action and well-thought-out typography on a floating menu.

The brand is known for its extended stay room, tailored to workers in the rural regions in which they operate. They market these stays as offering all of the comforts of home, allowing the working or long-term traveller to settle in for the long haul. We gave extended stays its own button at the top of the page and utilized bold typography and language choices to effectively communicate included amenities.

Booking options are stacked to give a streamlined list of available rooms. Design choices within the booking widget included bold, bright colours to make certain add-ons and additions stand out – like adding a pet fee to a booking, noting an early arrival, or booking multiple rooms at a time.

Kananaskis Nordic Spa Website

Nordic Spa Website

Designed entirely with the customer experience in mind, the new website has an app-like feel with intuitive features, mobile native scrolling and easy-to-navigate calls-to-action. With the aim being to showcase its noteworthy facilities, the site speaks to the spa’s rejuvenating amenities, inclusive ideology, and alpine aesthetic by utilizing contemporary and effective design elements.

Mobile First Web Design

Located in the heart of Kananaskis Country, Alberta’s only Nordic spa is found adjacent to the elegant Pomeroy Kananaskis Lodge in Kananaskis Village. The spa offers an array of distinctive facilities including a hydrotherapy circuit that utilizes the mantra of ‘hot, cold, rest, repeat’ borne of ancient Nordic wisdom found to promote invigorating wellness.

JYZ Design took customer feedback gathered directly through social media, chatbots and other customer communications. We utilized features that would effectively communicate the logistics and brand of this alpine sanctuary through mobile-first design and effective graphic design components. We simplified, streamlined and decluttered the user experience (UX). Users will be able to quickly see what their entry includes, where and how to book. Using real data from customers, the aim of the meticulously redesigned UX is to resolve previous search difficulties, adding functions like a search bar and chatbot to answer questions. JYZ Design utilized features that would give users an app-like experience – including a bottom menu bar, interactive map, live social board, chatbot, and more.

We further exemplified the exclusivity, diversity and welcoming nature of the brand through our imagery selection and copy – everyone is welcome in the community of wellness promoted by KNS. The redesign took the existing brand and elevated it to fit current trends while staying true to the signature tartan elements found throughout the spa that guests have come to know and love.

With a piece of ancient Nordic wisdom finding a home in the stunning setting of Kananaskis, visitors will understand what to expect, get their questions answered and easily find where to book, leading to an even more comprehensively enjoyable experience.

JJ Golf Branding & Website

Branding

Calgary is home to many golf lovers despite our short golf season and long winters. JJ Golf offers golfers an opportunity to practice their swing all year long, equipped with state-of-the-art technology and high-def graphics that illustrate world-famous golf courses. JJ Golf brings the outdoors in and its visual identity needed to reflect this. The logo mark and brand colours are inspired by the golf course and were incorporated into different touch points: website, signage and branded swag.

Website Design Inspired by Real-Life

Through strategic graphic design, we created a web-experience reflective of the brand’s real-life experience. JJ Golf’s virtual golf simulator offers customers the chance to play golf courses from around the world. We highlighted this by utilizing graphics that users could interact with throughout the website.

A sleek booking engine works to make the booking process effortless and uncomplicated for both customers and staff – making it easy to book and manage bookings.

Long Wing Capital Advisors Branding

Based out of Calgary, Longwing Capital Advisors bring 25 years of financial experience. As an established business leader, advisor, and investor, we knew Longwing’s branding package needed to be fitting of the financial sector while embodying the values and experience that set them apart.

Our Calgary web designers gained a deeper understanding of Longwing’s mission and values, allowing a methodical logo design and branding process.

Branding

As long-term locals themselves, Longwing Capital Advisors use their familiarity with local industries to specialize in complex strategic transactions within the energy industry, both domestic and cross-border.

While choosing design aspects including a font guide and brand colours, we considered how we would best portray the company’s air of sophistication. We decided to centre the brand’s colours around an inherently auspicious colour: gold. Other central brand colours included every-trendy turquoise and an autumnal yellow.

San-serif fonts were chosen to keep in the theme of modern, sleek imagery while ensuring any copy is easy to read.

Logo

We considered local visual identifiers that could communicate certain brand characteristics and resonate with their target audience. Ultimately, we used a combination of two design factors to create a chic, concise and credible logo. To tie in with the company’s name, we centred its logo around a minimalistic graphic of a falcon – a symbol of freedom and intuition known for its speed and precision.

As an ode to locals and local geographic features, we designed the falcon in the shape of Alberta’s treasured Rocky Mountains. These design choices communicate Longwing’s locality and establish a baseline level of trustworthiness based on a shared community alone.

JYZ Unveils New Kananaskis Nordic Spa Mobile First Website

Kananaskis Nordic Spa Mobile First website, innovative website design

An Explore Kananaskis tourism website has launched that details all the wonder of this natural, mountain paradise. Developed by Calgary web design company JYZ Design, this web portal was designed with the majesty of the area in mind, to give the viewer an intimate feel of what to expect when they visit. For those more local, it serves as a reminder for the endless natural wonders right at their doorstep.

10 Steps to Optimizing Your Website According to Google’s New Standards

If your business operates primarily online—like any eCommerce website—visibility is a priority. And the page experience update will affect that visibility. Plus, the user experience (UX) factors it includes, like the time it takes for your page to load and how smooth it is to navigate, play a crucial role in the customer journey. If the buying experience is seamless, people are more likely to complete their purchase, and even come back for more. This is Google’s primary focus with the last big update in May 2021. Our Calgary Web Design team has broken down and summarized in layman terms, some of the main changes and how this affects our web designs going forward.

Prioritizing above the fold content (Largest Contentful Paint (LCP))

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) is a measurement of the time taken for the main element of a page to fully load. LCP is one of the metrics used to evaluate perceived website responsiveness and is an important component in determining first meaningful paint, which takes into account the time taken to download all of the critical resources required to render above the fold content. Ideally, this should load under 2.5 seconds.

Image optimization into webp

The newest update to Google’s Page Experience Update, has a big focus on speed and UX. One big change is the image optimization into webp images. This is an important aspect of website optimization in general because page speed plays a major role in SEO rankings. Google’s latest announcement is all about making pages faster by reducing the length of time it takes for a page to load and how easy it is for users to navigate through your site. This includes things like removing ads that are not relevant for each user’s device and creating a smoother transition from one page to another.

Prioritizing speed when choosing a web host

One of the biggest changes with this update is prioritizing speed. Webmasters should always prioritize speed when choosing a web host, but now it’s more important than ever. Sites that load quickly are ranked higher by Google and will have an increased chance of winning over their prospective customers.

Reducing animations, transitions and video

Great transitions and animations can serve many purposes. When used appropriately, they can help users understand what’s changing and why, improve the look and feel of your design, and make navigation more intuitive. But when in doubt, speed comes first and may override the desire for creating trendy, modern looks. Our apprach to animations and video is to only use them if they serve an evident purpose, otherwise images will always load faster. Even when using video, we recommend hosting offsite to reduce storage use.

Implementing lazy loading

Lazy loading is a new way to improve the UX on your site. Instead of loading all the content, like images and videos, at once, it loads them as you scroll down. This means that people don’t have to wait for content to load when they’re scrolling through your website if there are a lot of images and text. Lazy loading decreases page load time by up to 50%, so it’s important for SEO.

Reduce any unexpected page movements (Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS))

Google considers any unexpected scrolling or movement through your site as a change in layout. This can result in pages not loading, which can be frustrating for the user and make it harder to understand where they are on your site. In order to reduce CLS, keep the top of your page free of links, buttons and other elements that may cause unexpected changes in page layouts. Be sure to have an easily accessible navigation bar that you know will not introduce any of these problems.

Near perfect mobile and tablet responsiveness

A key update to the page experience is that pages need to be more responsive on mobile devices, and Google will rank higher pages with great UX. Google anticipates traffic coming from mobile devices, so it’s important that your website is a seamless user experience when viewed on any screen. To achieve this, Google recommends designing websites with a responsive web design. To get a sense of what this looks like, imagine if you had an app for your website—all content should flow easily and take up the entire screen. Web layouts that are not responsive will be penalized by Google.