Duden Online

Reshaping an iconic brand’s digital services

03/2018—07/2018

Together w/

Drew Goldblatt, Joana Gordinho, Lotte Bijlsma, Louise Fuglsang, Marcel Bachran, Silke Krieg

Client

Bibliographisches Institut GmbH

Amongst native speakers the Duden is considered to be the German dictionary. Its publisher is striving to make it the number one worldwide reference for the German language: from German natives to foreign students and immigrants, from everyday people to professional writers, editors and translators. Duden Online had to become a provider of helpful digital services rather than a place to buy books.

In 2018 I lead a team to help transform Duden Online into a future-proof resource for all questions relating to the German language. Within the given Duden corporate design we defined a visual language that separates tools and educational content from entertaining content, and user input from Duden output.

A moodboard of Duden Online’s new visual language, consisting of icons, pictures, text elements and website components, aiming to provide an idea of what the new touch-points will look and feel like. — Different elements of Duden Online’s visual language

In a total of three sprints we explored several user journeys from dictionary usage to subscription management, audited content and analysed the existing structure of the Duden website. Lots of educational as well as entertaining content had to be made more accessible. New services had to be integrated.

Two parts of Duden Online’s start page providing quick access to the online dictionary via an input field and frequently searched words as well as teasing other content via differently designed interactive elements. — Start page providing quick access to the most established use case, the dictionary, and several new and renewed services of the Duden Online portfolio.

In several user flows we sketched out the overall potential and diverse modules of a user account shared between different web-based products. The new website concept and the new Duden Online design language will be applied to all future web services and products by the in-house team at Duden Online.

Workshop photo showing three people around a table working on a content clustering task for the new information architecture of Duden Online. — Client team and Silke Krieg forming new content clusters from the existing information architecture.

We have placed our visitors at the centre of development. The new website is geared to their diverse needs. We are continuing this dialogue so that we can remain the No. 1 contact point for all questions relating to the German language in the future.

Ramona Krause, Product Manager Digital at Duden

An arrangement of two screens, one showing a word definition page and the other a collection of links to official rule-sets and how-tos on grammar and style. — Word definition pages and lots of official rule-sets and how-tos on grammar and style

An arrangement of three screens: the user dashboard, payment information and dictionary bookmarks. — User dashboard, payment information and dictionary bookmarks.