Make-A-Wish is charity based in Phoenix, Arizona formed in 1983 with the mission to “create life-changing wishes to all children with a critical illness”. Today, Make-A-Wish has expanded into 5 countries with over 100 offices worldwide granting a wide array of wishes, from becoming a model, traveling to a foreign country, or adopting a pet. In order to grant these wishes, Make-A- Wish relies on donations and community efforts to create memorable moments for these children with 82% of their finances being dedicated to granting wishes. 

With the growing popularity of digital philanthropy and rise of millennials as the most charitable age group, Make-A-Wish needs a new digital design presence which most effectively reflects their values of playfulness and joy. In an effort to do just that, I created a responsive website and app for Make-A-Wish in BMGT458R: Advanced Computer Graphic Workshop. 

Due to the nature of Make-A-Wish's work, it seemed the most effective response to their current strategy was a repositioning of their digital design to target young families. Make-A-Wish partners with toy companies (Build-A-Bear, Disney, and Mattel) that children are aware of, therefore increasing brand recognition with children allows integration into everyday life. However, the ultimate target user are the parents of the children, as they are in charge of the financials of the family. Any parent can empathize with the mission of Make-A-Wish, as having your child become sick is an emotional and terrifying time for a parent. Donating to assist these families is something that is a personal cause for other parents as it is so similar to their own life. 

After determining strategy, I chose to highlight the mission of the Make-A-Wish mission through using a playful and imaginative aesthetic for my designs. With touches of glitter, watercolor paint strokes, and clear tape, the design feels like a child's art project rather than just a normal non-profit website. Blues dominate my color palette with pops of purple to pay homage to the logo of Make-A-Wish, with the selected typography of PlayFair as a serif font with paired with san serif Raleway. 

In terms of researching the design for Make-A-Wish, it became clear that the website needed to cater to both mobile devices and desktops. In 2017, mobile users accounted for 40% of the non-profit industries website visits, tablet visits were 10%, and the remaining 50% were desktop users. This statistic, along with the current multi-device consumer trends, made it imperative that the website be responsive, so it would function on either phone or desktop. While the repositioning is targeting both children and parents, the website skews toward parents as the target audience as it is more informative and calls for donations. 

For my website, I wanted formatting that would compliment the additional textures that would be featured throughout the site, which ultimately led to a simple, clean format. The home page functions as an informational source for the user as well as pushing donations

 As donating is the top priority, it's a repeated element throughout the design, in the navigation, below the hero image, and further down the page once the user has had time to learn more about the Make-A-Wish mission. In an effort to highlight Make-A-Wish's strong video presence, I chose to dedicate a portion of the website to video. Video is also the most engaging medium for consumers, posing the greatest possibility for persuasion and awareness. Going beyond just the highlighting the Make-A-Wish mission, the bottom section of the website includes links to articles about recently granted wishes and the children involved, humanizing the charity and their purpose. 

Through a grid based design, the website integrates function with the playful tone of the repositioning. Dropping the information icon above the fold of the website that was featured in my wireframes, there is now greater focus on the user making more active contributions to the charity. There's a depth of textures and additional visuals beyond just the information presented, functioning to add detail without taking too attention away from the information presented to the user. 

The responsive website, allows for users to have consistent information regardless of whether on desktop or mobile. Ideal for busy, young families to have on the go to access and conveniently share the website with other in their community. 

In order to add to the new website presence, rather than just repeat the same information, the purpose of the app is to raise awareness for Make-A-Wish with children as the target user. As parents are actively involved in their children's lives, make an app that children enjoy playing and download onto the parent's phone would raise awareness throughout the entire family. This also creates a life-long awareness for Make-A-Wish, once these children become older and can donate, they already have a positive relationship with Make-A-Wish and their mission. 

With development of the app, it was important that it appealed to children but had an informational section for parents to learn more about the charity. The app itself is a game, allowing the user to create the best day ever through a series of choices made in the app which launches mini games. There are a multitude of different storylines one can use, so a user would be motivated to repeat the game in order to reveal all possible mini games and plot lines. The secondary purpose of the app is the informational section, which is targeting parents to donate and contribute to the Make-A-Wish.

Due to the target user being a child, the wireframes for the app are very basic. It is button based with simple tap gestures to navigate throughout, all in order to insure that there is as little confusion as possible for the user. The information page is more text heavy, seeking to inform and persuade the user to make a contribution to Make-A-Wish. One issue that ensued with my wireframes was the absence of back arrows. As the story is meant to only go in one direction and the user is not permitted to change their decisions once past the point in the game, it was clear that a typical back button would not do. 

Designed to appeal to children, the app focuses heavily on a creative, whimsical approach, featuring a watercolor background throughout. The color palette remains consistent, focusing on blues with contrasting purple buttons guiding the user through the game. The home screen changed slightly from the wireframe concept to highlight the action of playing the game, with the secondary course of action being to learn more about Make-A-Wish. A banner was also added as a way for users to return to the home screen, solving the need for a back button. The ability to donate in the app was also added to the final design, in order to encourage an immediate user conversion. 

This app offers Make-A-Wish the opportunity to appeal to children, raise awareness in parents, and encourage future generations to contribute through integrating the mission of Make-A-Wish into their childhoods.