Wow, this project has been finished and the new site has been up for about a month. Things have been busy, otherwise I would have blogged about this earlier. However, to be completely honest I just don't know what to say about it. It was a blast to work on. During this project (and more than any other I've ever worked on) we had amazing collaboration between development and design. I'm very proud, not just of what we built but how we built it. What we obtained as a team was really special. It's kinda weird, because I feel that by talking about it I'll jinx the team and we won't be able to obtain this type of collaboration in the future. I'm sure this feeling will completely go away once the second project comes in with the same results and we prove that it actually is repeatable.
Here's an excerpt from an online article talking about the new website:
"We are committed to delivering products and support that address our customers' specific needs," says Drew Backeberg, manager of marketing and customer support at Portland, Ore.-based SelecTrucks, a Freightliner subsidiary. "Our new website offers unprecedented ease and access in searching the nation's largest selection of used trucks. It also provides complete information about our full suite of business support options."
With a streamlined new design, SelecTrucks.com incorporates user-friendly components designed to optimize the used truck search process while offering details about financing and warranty coverage. Interactive features direct trucking professionals to information specific to their business models, from fleet owners to owner-operators, and from longtime customers to first-time used truck buyers.
A directory provides links to retail center websites, where current inventory is searchable by make, model, price and mileage. A finance calculator enables consumers to estimate monthly payments and determine which trucks fit their budgets. The website also offers maintenance tips, safety advice and testimonials from SelecTrucks customers. While on the road, drivers can use the site to locate service centers, parts and maintenance specials within respective regions.
I was the tech lead on this project, and while I could talk about functionality like the dealer locator or syndicated content and job postings, I'd rather just look at this site and enjoy it. The design really is amazing. What else can I say? Before we started building out the website we did a paper-prototyping exercise which proved to be invaluable. This was real paper-protyping, with real users, real tasks, goals and objectives, and real paper. If you want to know more about how to do something similar, then take a look at this book and website. The actual paper prototypes which we generated wound up being our over-arching vision. Later on, whenever there was a conflict regarding implementation, layout, wording, behavior, etc; it was the paper-prototypes which we referred back to and used to come to a consensus and make decisions.