Overview
Sarcoma UK is a national charity that provides support for anyone affected by sarcoma, as well as funding vital research and campaigning for improved treatments.
A rare type of cancer that can affect bone and soft tissue, sarcoma can appear anywhere in the body. It’s often difficult to diagnose and can be even harder to treat. The charity relies on donations to work towards its vision: where everyone affected by sarcoma has the treatment, care, and support they need.
Our Creative Director James, turned to the Sarcoma UK website in March 2023 after being diagnosed with a synovial sarcoma in his right calf. Following surgery and treatment, he wanted to put his expertise to good use and reached out to the charity to offer our services in the form of a UX audit.
How We Helped
- UX Audit
- Accessibility Audit
- Usability Testing
- Customer Journey Mapping
- Information Architecture Review
- Prototyping
The Results
- Improved accessibility
- Highlighted Major Pain Points
- Improved Information Architecture
- Minimised Donation Friction
- Best Practice Recommendations
The Brief
Sarcoma UK’s website plays a vital role for patients, families, and healthcare professionals at difficult moments in their lives. It must provide clear, accessible, and reliable information, while also catering to fundraisers, volunteers, and researchers.
Key Challenges
- Ensure all users could easily find the information they needed
- Identify pain points across the mobile experience
- Improve accessibility and compliance with WCAG standards
- Test real user journeys to capture authentic feedback and insights
Objective
To create a more inclusive and usable website, ensuring journeys such as donations, information search, and resource downloads were seamless and user-friendly.
The Approach
Accessibility is Key
Accessibility is fundamental for a charity website, especially when users may be experiencing high stress or reduced digital confidence.
We began with a comprehensive accessibility audit using AccesiBe to benchmark the site against WCAG standards. This allowed us to surface both design and structural issues that were making the website harder to use, particularly for those with visual impairments.
- 95 severe accessibility issues identified on the homepage alone
- 61 colour contrast errors making buttons and links hard to read
- Only one button colour passed minimum accessibility guidelines
- Prioritised recommendations provided for immediate fixes
- Roadmap created for longer-term accessibility improvements
Usability Testing
To gain insight into how real users interacted with the site, we conducted remote usability testing with Sarcoma UK’s community.
We recruited participants across five key personas, ensuring we captured perspectives from healthcare professionals, patients, and fundraisers. Each participant completed real-world tasks in 60-minute Zoom sessions, sharing their thoughts aloud as they navigated the site.
- Five participants recruited through Sarcoma UK’s network
- Represented key personas: newly diagnosed patients, people in treatment, survivors, healthcare professionals, and fundraisers
- Recorded sessions captured navigation behaviour, frustrations, and positive experiences
- Key issues uncovered: donation button placement, search limitations, shop functionality barriers
- Demonstrated the importance of testing with non-digital experts for authentic feedback
Customer Journey Mapping
Following usability testing, we mapped critical customer journeys to better visualise pain points and opportunities for improvement.
We focused on journeys that mattered most to the charity: donations, finding information, and ordering support resources. By mapping highs and lows, we could demonstrate not only where improvements were needed, but also where the website was already performing well.
- Analysed the process of ordering a printed booklet from start to finish
- Highlighted difficulties with navigating back to the homepage after checkout
- Confirmed a smooth, positive ordering flow as a strength to build upon
- Created journey maps that visualised user frustrations in a simple, actionable format
- Provided the client with tools to prioritise fixes based on real user impact
Information Architecture Review
Information Architecture Review
One of the most consistent findings across testing was confusion around the navigation. Users often struggled to find information, partly due to unclear labels and partly due to the design of the menu itself.
To address this, we created a revised information architecture and tested it through high-fidelity prototypes. This gave the Sarcoma UK team a clear, visual demonstration of what a more user-friendly structure could look like.
- Developed a revised sitemap with clearer hierarchy and naming conventions
- Added missing links and reprioritised content to reflect user needs
- Proposed a new full-width header to maximise visibility of core pages
- Designed a larger secondary navigation, solving user confusion identified in testing
- Delivered high-fidelity mock-ups to show immediate, actionable changes
The Results
From audit to prototyping, Sarcoma UK gained a clearer, more user-friendly roadmap for their digital future
- Accessibility improved, with a roadmap to resolve 95 critical issues
- Donation friction reduced through usability insights and testing
- Major pain points in navigation and search highlighted for immediate action
- A revised information architecture delivered clearer pathways for all audiences
- Actionable recommendations empowered Sarcoma UK to implement changes with confidence
Your clarity and thoughtfulness throughout have been very welcome. It’s made what might have been a daunting process very smooth – thank you!
Enda Guinan, Digital Communications Manager at Sarcoma UK