The Challenge
Establish a new website architecture, showcase product lines more attractively, and bring the Klement’s Sausage online presence up to speed with their offline marketing campaigns.

The Solutions
Klement’s Sausage is well known nationally and in the Milwaukee area especially for their delicious sausage products and their beloved Racing Sausages that entertain crowds at every Milwaukee Brewers home game.

Molstad Consulting worked closely with the Klement’s IT and Marketing departments, advising on content strategy and presentation as well as leading discussions on graphic design direction. The Molstad Consulting team analyzed the company’s existing and upcoming marketing materials and designed a look and feel that combines the “taste and fun” as well as the tradition of excellence Klement’s is famous for. Flash animations were created to showcase products and their popular “Patio Daddio” television commercials.

The Famous Klement’s Racing Sausages, were featured on the site complete with their history, bios, downloadable wallpapers and a custom-designed Flash video game. The game allows site visitors to race as their favorite sausage through the streets of Milwaukee to the Brewers opening day game.

The Response
“I’m extremely pleased with the way our web site project went from concept to completion. The Molstad team took the time to listen in order to make sure we got what we wanted. Their great service, knowledge and art talent is incomparable. They have assisted in driving our brand image by offering exceptional ideas and a unique design that has also translated into sales. I’ll definitely be calling Molstad Consulting the next time I’m in need of the services they provide.”
- Jim Westerman, Marketing Director for Klement’s Sausage

Ecommerce, Flash, Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management, Web Strategy Consulting Ecommerce, Flash, Information Architecture, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management, Wireframes

The Challenge
Expand, enhance, and improve the online services of a world-class tea producer’s ecommerce website to satisfy a sophisticated and steadily growing customer base.

The Solutions
Rishi Tea is synonymous with quality. Partnering directly with tea artisans from China, Japan and other regions, they offer their products in fine food stores, restaurants, and coffee shops throughout the United States.

The third-party system powering Rishi Tea’s ecommerce website provides a core technical structure, however its default output sometimes falls short in the areas of layout and aesthetics. Rishi Tea approached Molstad Consulting to help optimize the overall user experience and expand the site’s offerings.

Molstad Consulting led discussions to prioritize short term and long term goals, mapped out requirements and implemented numerous custom solutions. Featured additions and enhancements include:

• Online, automatic credit card processing via a gateway
• Ability to process Canada orders
• Electronic gift certificates
• Retail locator search application
• Setup of Google Analytics including advanced ecommerce data tracking, local traffic exclusion and consulting
• Checkout process and customer experience optimization through many modifications and additions (improved navigation, information design, system response, form validation, shipping instructions, email content, and more)
• User account area enhancements
• Security and version upgrades
• Consulting on internet marketing techniques and technologies
• Troubleshooting and squashing of many system bugs

Operating as an exension of Rishi Tea’s internal staff, Molstad Consulting continues to make recommendations and provide services on a flexible, as-needed basis.

The Results
Rishi Tea enjoys improved business intelligence through analytics software, better customer relationships and fewer support calls, lightened internal staff responsibilities, and a clear, prioritized plan for future enhancements and internet marketing efforts.

Ecommerce, Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Analytics, Web Project Management, Web Strategy Consulting Ecommerce, Expert Review, Information Architecture, User Interface Design, Web Project Management

The Challenge
Completely overhaul and improve the company’s online identity, both graphically and functionally, and enhance the home search experience.

The Solutions
HomeSale Realty’s previous site was quickly becoming too small to contain the content and functionality necessary to represent the fastest growing real estate brokerage in Wisconsin. The property search confused most users and was getting little traffic.

Molstad Consulting conducted a requirements analysis, fully documented the findings and prototypes and led a multi-disciplinary team in designing the new front-end and back-end interfaces.

Public site visitors now enjoy a much more robust and user-friendly property search of the entire Multiple Listing Service and can sign up to be automatically updated via email when properties that match their search criteria become available. A home search can begin right from the homepage by clicking on a county taking the user to a screen to see the number of listings available in each community. From there the search can be narrowed using extensive new search criteria options.

Each property allows a home buyer to view a dynamic notification of open houses, virtual tours and multiple property photos with a unique caption for each. They can also map the property, request a showing (sent directly to the listing agent) or click an agent’s photo or name to jump to that agent’s custom online vanity page.

The back-end automatically downloads all available MLS property data into the system on a nightly basis and allows the staff to manage the brokerage’s available properties, open houses, virtual tours, agent profiles and property update accounts. They enjoy instantaneous updates to the public site which previously had to be run through a separate agency.

Each agent has a separate login to manage their own properties, open houses and profile.

The public site also features an extensive “Newsroom” area giving the media and public easy access to notifications of HomeSale’s many and frequent accomplishments. These include HomeSale’s television commercials featuring Pat “Mr. Miyagi” Morita integrated into a custom-designed Flash video player.

The Response
“Without any extra clicks, the home buyer gets what they’re looking for the instant they land on our homepage.”

- Roy Scholtka, President of HomeSale Realty

Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Project Management Information Architecture, Market Research, User Interface Design, Web Project Management, Wireframes

The Challenge
Create an information space and central task area to bring together five offices, 200 agents, and piles of disparate documentation.

The Solutions
Along with HomeSale Realty’s impressive growth and success has come the challenge of maintaining efficient communication and uniformity of process and documents between multiple offices.

Molstad Consulting interviewed key decision makers, analyzed HomeSale’s methods and business practices and developed a portal-based, scalable information architecture to accommodate widely varied user needs, tasks and access levels.

A Web-based content management system was implemented giving particular staff members instant access to update the content they’re responsible for. With their agents constantly on the go, this content needed to be version-controlled, and immediately accessible. The role of publishing content has been shifted to its creator.

The intranet features a single sign-on gateway to essential real estate forms, listing data sheets, training and marketing materials, as well as their public site administration tool to manage listings, agent profiles, open houses and more.

Truly a company of friends and family, HomeSale wanted to create a closer bond with its community of staff and agents. The intranet helps accomplish this via a central area for discussion, social events and announcements.

The intranet has already taken on a life of its own and has the flexibility to grow in step with the ever-evolving HomeSale organization.

Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Project Management Information Architecture, Market Research, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management

The Challenge
Help a new and innovative commercial roof bidding website go from good to great.

The Solutions
Molstad Consulting was approached by Top Floor Technologies to perform a professional review of their client’s complex roof project bidding website. The system consisted of more than 50 unique interfaces to be evaluated.

The resulting document featured numerous annotated screen shots organized by user access and task flows with detailed recommendations for improvements in the areas of information architecture, information design, graphic design, interface usability, user task fulfillment, help system usability, and copywriting.

The site is currently reflecting many of these recommendations with more updates in progress and the company plans to introduce new functionality based on broader strategic observations.

The Response
The RoofBidsNow.com website has seen an increase of contractor signups amounting to nearly 250 contractors nationwide. The company has been featured in Roofing/Siding/Insulation Magazine and has enjoyed many newly submitted positive user testimonials.

Expert Review, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design Expert Review, User Interface Design, Wireframes

The Challenge
Enable an up-and-coming new real estate brokerage to compete with the big boys on the Web.

The Solutions
Home Advisors, Inc., based out of St. Paul, MN is a forward-thinking real estate brokerage that embraces new technology to better serve its customers.

Molstad Consulting conducted a thorough discovery and analysis outlining a progressive plan for the company’s web presence and online services. The current site represents a fresh look and feel along with a new logo to reflect Home Advisors’ committment to provide value and build trust with their customers.

The custom-developed site features a variety of lead capturing forms as well as a portal to Home Advisor’s customer tools including transaction monitoring and showing management. A home search management tool will soon be added to the extensive service offering.

A system to promote the brokerage’s listings was also created featuring an adminstration area for quick and easy publishing. Next phase plans include an extensive real estate resource and lead-capturing website that will be entertaining as well as informative. Stay tuned…

The Response
“The concept behind developing the web presence for Home Advisors, Inc. was to create a fully customized interface from scratch that could present a simple, yet powerful communication tool for us and our clients.

We were able to successfully implement this concept because of some of the unique features of Molstad Consulting.

First, I was excited to work with Brian because of his genuine enthusiasm to truly understand me and my business. I never felt like it was simply “give me your stuff and I’ll slap together a site for you.” He took the time to understand what I was trying to accomplish from a strategic perspective and really worked to create an interface that supported all of my ideas.

Second, I was very impressed with Brian’s approach to viewing websites as a part of the overall business plan for a company. He thinks as much through a business mindset as he does from a technical perspective. What this did was create the feeling like he was working with me instead of for me. Being able to discuss the business implications of a technical decision was a refreshing feeling that I truly appreciated.

Overall, working with Molstad Consulting has been instrumental in helping me create the foundations for my business without compromise and I would recommend the company to anyone serious about creating a web presence for their business.”
- Mark Duquesnoy, Owner

Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management Information Architecture, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management

The Challenge
Bring the new Direct Mortgage Funding branding identity online.

The Solutions
DMF already had a new branding identity in place for their print materials, but needed to bridge the gap to the Internet.

Molstad Consulting conducted a competitive analysis of sites in their industry and others to lead the team to a consensus on layout and merging their marketing themes with global navigation options.

Flash was integrated into the navigation to create a tighter link with the branding elements highlighting each of DMF’s main service offerings.

Their customers were demanding fast access to DMF’s rates and so a password protected area was created to house the daily-updated data.

The Response
“The interface between Molstad, his production team, our in-house staff and our external partners was absolutely flawless. The end result was a website that is earning us praise from all of our clients both for its look and utility.”

- Todd Harple, Ph.D., Organization Anthropologist

Flash, Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management Flash, Information Architecture, Web Development, Web Graphic Design

The Challenge
TroyResearch is an Internet-focused consumer opinion market research firm. From online focus groups to custom surveys to hybrid Internet/traditional methodologies, they use Internet technology to help their clients stay in touch with their customers quickly and cost-effectively.

TroyResearch operates a massive back-end system to administrative their online services and client data. Maintaining and adding to this system was becoming more and more complex and difficult to manage resulting in higher costs and extended deadlines.

The Solutions
Molstad Consulting introduced new methods of documentation and project management, including functionality specifications and wireframes, serving as prototypes of interface elements as well as a context for decision making. This documentation became the blueprints for TroyResearch developers on multiple projects, giving them a clear picture of user needs and programming requirements.

Featured projects include:

General Market Research Tools

• Allows for expansion of Troy Research market research services into other industries
• Created multiple new online, dynamic reports, with expanded calculations, allowing radio stations and other clients to conduct a more efficient and detailed statistical analysis of their survey data with a focus on usability
• The new reports allow for crosstabbing, trending, frequency tables, participation reports and multi-filtering

Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Project Management Information Architecture, Market Research, User Interface Design, Wireframes

The Challenge
Enable a medical optometrist to stay connected with her patients and provide them with valuable vision resources.

The Solutions
Dr. Haefs is a highly experienced and regularly published medical optometrist in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Dr. Haefs sees patients at multiple locations and needed to make it as easy as possible for them to find her.

Molstad Consulting developed an architecture and fresh design to help Dr. Haefs establish a unique presence showcasing her experience and extensive patient vision resources. The site also serves as a medium through which to feature her frequent publications including articles and a video segment on “Vision and Learning” from a recent local television news interview.

Dr. Haefs was also provided with and trained on a site editing tool putting her in control of her own content. The site is truly standing out in a local community of largely neglected and under-utilized optometrist websites.

The Response
“Molstad Consulting has created more than a beautiful website for my practice, they’ve created a means for me to easily provide vision health information and resources to my patients as well as a way to stay connected with them. The process of designing the site went smoothly and was even fun. They’ve exceeded my expectations in designing an accessible site that’s as easy to navigate as it is to look at.”
- Christina Haefs, OD

Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management Information Architecture, Physician Website, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management

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The Challenge
Enable a Family Medicine physician to stay connected with his patients.

The Solutions
Dr. Bonavia is a highly experienced Family Medicine physician in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. A recent change in hosptial affiliations left Dr. Bonavia concerned that his network of patients, developed over decades, would have difficulty finding him.

Molstad Consulting developed an architecture and fresh design to help Dr. Bonavia establish a unique presence showcasing his experience and exceptional patient testimonials. The site also serves as a medium through which to feature news, announcements and valuable health resources for his patient base.

Dr. Bonavia has discovered that, with his own site, he is in control of his patient contacts, his professional image and how he wants to offer valuable resources to the public.

The Response
“As a Family Physician, my expertise does not lie with computers or
websites. When you are working with Brian Molstad of Molstad
Consulting, that is just fine. Brian walks you through the process and
in so doing discovers your goals for the website, likes and dislikes.
The final product will be extremely personalized for you, yet very
functional. I especially appreciate his cost-effective strategies in
producing my website and his continued interest in its success. I
highly recommend Molstad Consulting for your web design needs.”
- John P. Bonavia, MD

Information Architecture, Molstad Consulting Case Studies, User Interface Design, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management Information Architecture, Physician Website, Web Development, Web Graphic Design, Web Project Management