Illinois Answers

Project Overview

The Better Government Association came to us with a big vision for a new brand. It didn’t even have a name yet.

BGA set out to create a nonprofit media venture, which we helped name the Illinois Answers Project, focused on investigative journalism with a twist. In addition to covering the problem, they would surface solutions — things that have worked elsewhere. And they intended to do it digitally, in person, and in many other ways.

The goal: Empower readers— citizens of Illinois and their leaders — with the information needed to be equal participants in our democracy. We couldn’t have been more eager to help them

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Partner

We designed everything, starting with the strategy, messaging, naming, and brand identity. Melissa Harris led the new organization’s parent, BGA, through a messaging exercise to understand how this work fits into the overall mission.

Then our team began creating the digital experience for the new Illinois Answers Project.

As an entirely new publication, we understood that many folks’ first visit would be to an article page and that they likely wouldn’t be familiar with the organization yet. But they would be familiar with BGA, which had just won a Pulitzer Prize for its local reporting in partnership with the Chicago Tribune.

We wanted to make sure anyone visiting the Illinois Answers site could understand who they are and what they do right away. We also aimed to convert readers into newsletter subscribers and members as seamlessly as possible. All while using a color palette and content recirculation to call back to BGA itself.

We also then redesigned BGA’s branding and site as well, renaming it BGA Policy to immediately convey its mission more clearly: Its watchdog role in holding government and elected officials to account.

Multiple homepage layouts allow editors to shift the display of their coverage for big news or policy events. Curated collections make it easy for their team to package news by theme and drive readers to coverage areas they’re interested in. We built all of this with flexibility in mind, knowing the team, their sites, and coverage would surely need room to grow.