New Carbonmade Launch is Beautiful

I’ve loved Carbonmade for quite some time, and have had the pleasure of meeting the team in NYC.  Today they release their new design, which is downright beautiful.

I love about the landing page:

  • simplicity of the message (Your online portfolio)
  • positive notes (unicorn and a giant “Yeah!”)
  • Colors
  • Lead gen (Sign-up! and Try the demo.)
  • Call to free, personalization, and community

I like looking at examples, so I click on over to the 2nd thing on the nav (like you read my mind) and am taken to a much more professional and clean design with matching style and enthusiasm.

Clear message, still focus on driving sign ups but also saying our community is awesome (see the “Awesome” badge?).

It says what they do by category labels (photographer can see what other photographers are doing).  As well as a basic sampling. Tim Van Damme is listed, and has a fantastic portfolio to look at.

Their progress page is a fresh and fantastic push at transparency.  It is a blog of sorts talking about action and reality of their service.

A personal pet peeve of mine is the Kathy Sierra-esk ‘WTF’ button at the bottom, a giant help icon that takes you to a really well thought out FAQ.   I wish a feedback loop was a bit tighter, but that is just my perception.  In reality, would be highly surprised if Spencer wasn’t the first comment on this post.  They are on it as a company with their customers and fans.

It is a shining showcase of how to build a site for users, and how to evolve as a startup.  It has character, great design and shines with usability.  It doesn’t say ‘we kick ass’ it says ‘our community and you kick ass.’

Their old site was great, this is phenomenal.  Well done team, well done.


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12 responses to “New Carbonmade Launch is Beautiful”

  1. Matt Avatar

    I agree with everything. I think the only thing they missed out on was considering link styles on hover to help me know what I am going to click on when I click. Ex. no change in font or image style when hovering over main navigation links.

    Other then that, simply love it & unicorns rock.

  2. Jason Avatar

    Thanks guys!

  3. Steve Avatar

    It's an inspiring design and a great use of 'illustration', not just 'graphics', to guide the viewer through the site. I appreciate that the various pages have different color schemes, yet adhere to a consistent style.

  4. Spencer Fry Avatar

    Thanks, Matt! Small details will be added/tweaked over the next week or so. We felt like we should just get it out there, see how it was being received, and then do a little clean up over the next week.

  5. Spencer Fry Avatar

    Andrew, thanks so much for writing this up. That was super quick after we launched. 🙂 Points for that hehe. Question: “I wish a feedback loop was a bit tighter, but that is just my perception.” What do you mean by that exactly?

  6. Pasquale D'Silva Avatar

    Spencer, Dave & Jason are all marvelous men.

  7. Jameson Detweiler Avatar

    Wow, some really great stuff and a lot to learn from. We're working on redesigning the GreenKonnect home page, so this is great to see.

    I especially dig the sign up page. It really drives action.

  8. Matt Avatar

    No problem, I just call it like I see it. Great job though on execution & concept. 🙂

  9. Matt Avatar

    No problem, I just call it like I see it. Great job though on execution & concept. 🙂

  10. […] Andrew Hyde also wrote about Carbonmade’s launch, and shares more perspective on his blog. AKPC_IDS += "5146,"; […]

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