Challenge
Hearing Dogs for Deaf People trains highly skilled dogs to alert deaf people to life-saving sounds, helping over 1,100 active partnerships across the UK reconnect with their communities and regain independence.
The charity was operating with two separate, outdated websites which created real accessibility barriers and undermined public trust.
For an organisation doing such life-changing work, this digital experience sent the wrong signal about credibility, and quietly suppressed its ability to generate income and scale its services.
Solution
A presence worthy of the mission
Our goal was clear: create the foundations of a digital presence worthy of the life-changing work Hearing Dogs for Deaf People actually does.
We began with a strategic digital review, mapping the organisation's pain points, priorities and technical architecture to identify where the real opportunities lay.
The case for consolidating the two legacy websites into a single, cohesive offering was already clear; but reaching a prioritised feature list required an evidence base to align the organisation internally and spend budget wisely.
From this, we produced a concrete backlog and set of workstreams: the building blocks for a single, coherent destination for the public.
A refreshed brand
Part of our brief was to modernise Hearing Dogs for Deaf People's brand, to make it feel contemporary and work harder online.
We defined a clear personality (Compassionate, Trustworthy, Hopeful) to give the organisation a consistent voice and visual language, brought to life through a new illustration style. Then, with accessibility as a guiding principle, we pared back the fragmented visual system in favour of something cleaner – introducing high-contrast rules and a minimum type size – producing a coherent identity that works for everyone.
The result is a modernised brand where accessibility is the foundation the whole system is built on.
Built to last
With the strategic foundations in place, the focus turned to technical solutions.
We selected Drupal, hosted on Acquia, as a platform that could meet the organisation's current needs and scale with its ambitions.
Alongside this, we introduced a component-based UI library (Storybook) to give the team the composable building blocks for the future.
The result is a robust, secure platform built around easy-to-understand user journeys and an editorial experience the team has full ownership of.
Investing in the future
A new digital platform creates capability. Helping Hearing Dogs for Deaf People make the most of it meant working beyond the build.
We worked alongside the Individual Giving team to make that case to the board, delivering a data-driven business case to shift the fundraising focus to diversification and innovation.
The result was a commitment of financial backing and strategic clarity for the individual giving team, helping the organisation move beyond legacy dependency toward a sustainable future.
Impact
This project was the catalyst for a new era at Hearing Dogs for Deaf People.
By closing the gap between the work they do and how they show up online, we’ve given them a platform for long-term innovation.
Together, we:
- Closed the credibility gap by unifying two legacy sites into one compelling digital experience
- Prioritised inclusion by creating a brand that’s warm, engaging and accessible by default
- Empowered the team to maximise the website investment through hands-on support with the Individual Giving team