A guide to designing audits.

{📒} – What are project audits, why do you need one, and how to conduct them?

The word "audit" generally doesn't inspire enthusiasm, but when it comes to an audit of project , Well… conducting it might at least lead to some interesting results for your product and brand.

A design audit involves analyzing all design elements used throughout the organization to ensure brand consistency across all channels and points of sale. This means evaluating not only visual design elements but also the verbal and written aspects of the user experience.

Design audits have gained popularity in recent years, and for good reason. Let's break down the components of a design audit and then dive into how to conduct one of your own.

What is a design audit?

Every good product designer knows that one thing is always true: consistency in design has a huge influence on the customer experience. As designers, we need to ensure that customers receive the same message at every touchpoint. This leads us to design auditing.

A website project audit is basically a checkup to ensure that the company is consistently expressing itself across all channels.

By analyzing your organization's visual elements, as well as its main messages, you can compare this with what users are seeing. really Monitoring the user's entire journey and correcting any inconsistencies.

Essentially, a project audit requires you to gather and evaluate all forms of visual, written, and verbal communication, from the website to advertisements and social media – including workshops or webinars you host – to the product itself. Users go through dozens, if not hundreds, of touchpoints on their journey to and through your product. Is their experience consistent and reliable, or erratic and unpredictable?

Why is a design audit important?

Imagine that the visual elements of your organization and product are the "wardrobe" of your brand. The "visual" image, built from your visual assets, plays a crucial role in how your brand is perceived by the public, forming a large part of your company's identity. This is generally much easier to manage when you own a small business, but as the company grows, you can avoid any inconsistencies down the road with a thorough audit.

For example, imagine your materials are printed in several remote locations instead of one main location. An audit can help ensure that all selected visual elements have been used consistently across all marketing materials, and that you haven't ended up with different fonts on your business cards. That's enough to make a good designer want to tear their hair out.

You need to maintain a consistent user experience if you want to build trust. And as your organization grows and you add more and more features and elements to your product, this becomes increasingly difficult to control. Enter design auditing.

Consistency helps build trust.

The thing we've been talking about since the beginning of this article is the consistency .

Why?

Because the importance of consistency in building trust with your audience cannot be stressed enough. It's a key component of good product design and needs to remain top of mind at all times. But users aren't the only audience you're thinking about – we're also helping to build trust and consistency internally.

If you want to ensure that all members of your team are on the same page, you must guide them in the right direction. A design audit can help your team better understand the direction and goals, making it a fun and effective way to bring your team together.

How to audit your website

Every website audit design checklist begins with gathering all possible assets to get a near-perfect overview of your organization's external communication.

Every detail is essential and should not be overlooked. Yes, it can be a complicated process to gather everything, but it's essential.

So, what elements should you pay special attention to? Here's a list of places to start:

Any existing style guides or design systems
Website pages (yes, all of them)
Logo in all formats and use cases
Web ads
Standalone landing pages, marketing campaigns, and all their guarantees.
Classes, workshops, presentations, promotional lectures
Social media content
Original design files compared to what is currently active.

Don't forget to include things you haven't released yet, but plan to release soon.

After having all of this in one place, take a good look at everything to get a better idea of the bigger picture.

Search for inconsistencies by examining all of its existing properties.

Analyze the website

Before engaging in the analysis of the visual elements of your product and organization, you need to have a clear idea of what the brand direction is (or should be).

A website project audit checklist will help you find inconsistencies, flaws, and other design problems that work against your brand idea and the direction you have in mind.

Here are some things to consider:

Is the navigation the same on all pages?
Is the same logo file always used across multiple assets?
Are the background patterns consistent? What are the background styles?
Is the mobile design usable and accessible? Does it follow brand guidelines?
Are all the icons from the same set?
Do similar sections follow the same design conventions and styles?
Is the typography always the same?
Are the pop-ups and hello bars aligned with the brand?
How do landing pages compare to the main website? Do they adhere to brand guidelines? Do they use the correct logo and colors?

Analyzing your social media

Taking a closer look at your website isn't enough. You also need to analyze your social media pages to ensure you're sending the right message.

Ask yourself the following questions:

Are the messages expressed on social media aligned with the messages you share on your website and in advertising?
Is the copywriting consistent across platforms and brand guidelines?
Are the images properly designed and sized to match your brand standards?
Are you creating content that is an extension of your brand values, or does it feel more autonomous?

Analyze posts on third-party websites.

Don't forget about your posts on third-party sites like Product Hunt and others. These channels are some of the biggest traffic funnels for your website and product. You want readers to navigate from one to the other without experiencing a jarring transition.

Capture everything you've collected.

This isn't necessarily required for a successful design audit, but capturing all pages, all interactions, and everything else will make your job much easier.

There's a chance you'll want to go back and check something at some point in the future, and having screenshots is easier than digging through everything again. Plus, it makes for an interesting portfolio to look back on as your company grows and matures.

Create a report detailing what's good, what's bad, and how to fix it.

Now comes the most time-consuming part: analyzing everything you've collected and creating a report of what's good – and what needs to be corrected.

Document and summarize all of this to share with your team. .

This will help you understand why you made certain decisions.

Review everything you captured.

At this point, you've analyzed your website, apps, and social media and taken several screenshots. Now it's time to review all of that to get a better idea of what your next steps should be.

Look for patterns

Organize the elements into intervals, looking for patterns that will emerge during the analysis process.

Look for similarities that will help you recognize the standard convention that users are already familiar with.

Tone, voice and message

Now that you have carefully examined all the visual elements, don't forget to consider the tone, voice, and overall message of the content in question.

Once again, pay attention to patterns that may emerge and, just like with visual elements, ensure that the tone, voice, and message are consistent. This process may seem endless, but don't be tempted to ignore or "accidentally" overlook anything; you'll thank yourself (and your organization and product too, if you can) later.

There's also a good chance that the overall message and tone have evolved over time, so look at older elements and adjust or remove them if they no longer fit.

Perhaps you'll even realize you're not satisfied with your company's overall tone, voice, and message, and decide to change it completely. Now is a good time to do so, since you're analyzing everything anyway.

Present your findings

Once the project audit is complete, you should present a detailed report of your findings to the entire team. Show what is right, what is wrong, what needs to be corrected, and your ideas on how to correct them.

Present the patterns you observed, show the extent of the inconsistencies, and offer suggestions on how to avoid similar inconsistencies in the future.

Also consider the ideas of your team members; having a quick brainstorming session can result in a number of great ideas for new improvements.

Even if you decide not to do it immediately, creating a documented report can be very useful in the future. For example, other designers on your team may benefit from your findings when conducting their own audit.

Create a clear improvement plan.

To truly benefit from the audit you just completed, you need to create a solid plan for improvements – piece by piece.

Remember that to create consistency, you need to ensure that all members of your team are on the same page. An improvement plan won't make much difference if you're the only one using it! A simple way to do this is to create or update your brand and style guidelines and conduct team training on them.

Make sure all members of your team understand the different brand features; from the use of the logo to a list of vocabulary you've decided to adopt in your written communication. Remember that it's not just about the consistency of your visual elements, but also your tone, voice, and message. And don't just think about it – you'll need to revisit these topics over time to ensure they hold up.

Create an ongoing schedule.

After completing your first project audit, you can make things much easier for yourself in the future by creating an ongoing schedule of check-ins in order to minimize the possibility of developing future inconsistencies in communication.

One of the easiest ways to do this is to create a compilation of rules for future design changes to your website. This is also known as a design standards manual.

This manual keeps everyone on your team on the same page(s) and makes sure your common goals are clear.

When everyone in your organization truly understands your visual brand, as well as the overall message you're trying to communicate to the public, the number of inconsistencies will decrease dramatically.

What are you waiting for?

So, how should you conduct a site audit and why? In this article, we examine the basics every designer should know about a project audit and the benefits it brings.

The most important things to remember are:

You should analyze the visual elements, as well as the overall message, tone, and voice of your company.
Consistent communication with your audience is one of the critical components of good design and a reliable user experience.
Keep all your team members on the same page, ensuring they understand your visual brand and the type of communication you intend to establish with your audience.
Follow our simple guide through each step of a proper project audit, uncover any inconsistencies in your own company, and eliminate them at the root!