The Sikh Coalition is a national movement-building organization that stands up for Sikh Americans, and as a result, the civil and human rights of all people. Needing to strengthen their brand and website, the Coalition asked Constructive to develop a design strategy to better inspire their community, strengthen support for their advocacy platform and legal support work, increase donations and strategic partnerships, and generate concrete action. Together, we created new branding as bold as the Coalition’s mission and an online presence that connects with the Sikh community—strengthening the civil rights organization’s national leadership to realize a world where Sikhs are free to practice and enjoy their faith.
A Brand & Website That Failed to Resonate
When The Sikh Coalition engaged Constructive, they were stuck with an uninspiring website that was difficult to navigate, that failed to engage their community, and was not achieving online fundraising goals. Making the problem worse, the Coalition’s branding lacked energy and didn’t resonate with and excite their activist base, making the brand feeling flat. On the backend, the Coalition suffered with a complicated, glitchy CMS that made managing their content a chore and sub-par security left them prone to malicious hacks. Taken together, the result was a generic, text-heavy website that was difficult to manage and lacked the visual punch to emotionally connect audiences to the mission, activate audiences, and convey the Coalition’s commitment to its community.
Connecting Audiences to the Coalition’s Advocacy Mission
Similar to other civil rights nonprofits like the NAACP and the Anti- Defamation League, The Sikh Coalition is engaged in a wide range of work—from legal services, education, and advocacy to media outreach, organizing, and community empowerment. To meet the needs of diverse audiences, we developed integrated content strategy and information architecture that strengthens the Coalition’s brand and advances their mission by placing their organization’s efforts into greater social and cultural context. The result is a user experience that deepens understanding of Sikh culture and the key issues, that connects audiences to The Sikh Coalition’s programs, campaigns, and impact, that provides information and resources to help their community, and directs users towards action within a comprehensive advocacy platform.
A Bold Brand That Reflects its Community
Brands belong to the audience—they’re not what you say you are, they’re what they say you are. So, a movement-building organization, The Sikh Coalition’s branding needed to resonate with their community. We dramatically changed the Coalition’s look and feel, creating a new system of typography, colors, image treatments, and illustrations that embody the Sikh community’s strength and pride. Site design leads with bold imagery that demonstrates the civil rights nonprofit’s commitment to action and engagement. And subtle textures and design treatments complement a strong design, adding nuance, softness and an emotional connection.
Empowering Coalition Staff
While designing a great experience for website visitors was a top priority, The Sikh Coalition’s team was very clear that they desperately needed a CMS that didn’t make their lives a nightmare when managing their website. We customized a WordPress backend with user-friendly workflows and automation that make it easy and intuitive to create content-rich pages, automatically connect related content by issue area and program, and maintain a strong, cohesive design system.
Our Client’s Take
“We needed a partner who knew how to communicate social impact, elicit support, and generate action. We also needed flexibility—but with guardrails to preserve the integrity of our brand and website—so that we wouldn’t have to ask our agency to make every little change. And we wanted a stable, friendly CMS to make it easy for more people on our team to update content. Everyone at Constructive was deeply invested in the work we do and in our success. The results have made a major difference and, most importantly, have blown away our audiences!” Satjeet Kaur, Executive Director.
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