Designed Key Trust Flows for an LGBTQIA+ Support Platform
Designing a coherent, accessible site for an LGBTQIA+ nonprofit. From sitemap through to a responsive build with working donation and authentication flows. Through Develop for Good, I worked with a PM, TPM, designers, and engineers to refine key flows, incorporate usability feedback, and support a maintainable WordPress launch.
A trust-first website for LGBTQIA+ adults seeking connection and support
Pride Family helps LGBTQIA+ adults find chosen family through a matching program, while offering practical resources and a clear way to support the mission through donations. The site needed consistency, clearer pathways, and working fundamentals so visitors could understand the program quickly, take action with confidence, and get help without hunting. I served as lead designer, collaborating closely with the PM and TPM to align on scope and priorities.
Two distinct users with very different needs
What shaped the decisions
Every design decision ran through these four constraints.
Sensitive user context, where privacy and safety mattered as much as usability
A low-code WordPress stack, which shaped what could be implemented and maintained long term
Limited launch analytics, which made usability testing the main source of signal during iteration
Multiple user roles with different permissions and workflows
A site that needed to earn trust fast
Pride Family needed a complete, coherent website that could explain the mission, guide visitors into matching and resources, and support donations without confusion. The challenge was not just to “design a nonprofit website.” The real challenge was making a trust-sensitive platform feel safe and understandable for users arriving with urgency, while keeping the implementation realistic in WordPress for long-term client maintenance. That meant balancing user clarity, privacy, moderation needs, and technical feasibility across sign-up, matching, messaging, and admin functionality. So we built the full experience, then focused on the moments where uncertainty causes drop-off.
"What should a user do next, and can they do it without doubt?"
Clarity as a design principle, not just an aesthetic
Rather than optimizing for visual novelty, the entire strategy was oriented around reducing uncertainty at decision points.
Make navigation predictable — clarity beats cleverness
Consistency is a trust signal
Reduce decision load at high-intent moments
Build patterns the team can maintain
If we clearly explain matching and resources with consistent CTAs, more visitors will take an action instead of bouncing.
If the trust flows feel straightforward, users will finish login recovery and donation completion with less hesitation.
What we built, in what order, and why
A complete site creates comprehension. Trust flows protect conversion and credibility. So we standardized first, then shored up the moments where uncertainty causes drop-off.
Eight steps from sitemap to shipped
A lean, structured process where each phase had a clear output — so nothing drifted.
Remote usability testing with 6 participants
Testing focused on first-time comprehension — could a new visitor understand the mission, navigate to key actions, and complete trust flows without hesitation?
- 01Explain what Pride Family does in your own words
- 02Find how matching works and what you would do next
- 03Find resources for immediate support
- 04Find where donating fits into the experience
- 05Interpret the login and recovery experience
- 06Find how to contact the team
- Users responded well to a clear mission and direct calls to action
- Some users hesitated on the resources page when categories were not immediately obvious
- Donation intent increased when Donate was consistently visible and not buried
- Users trusted the site more when pages shared consistent structure and tone
- Simplified navigation cues and reinforced primary CTAs on key pages
- Improved scannability on resources by tightening hierarchy and clarifying labels
- Reduced unnecessary variation in page sections so users did not have to relearn patterns
Shipped scope plus usability evidence
Because analytics were not yet available at launch, results are framed as shipped scope plus usability evidence from testing.
See it in action
Website demonstration
If I kept going
These are the highest-leverage moves I'd pursue in the next sprint.
The work that mattered most was invisible
Building the full site forced a clear product question: what should a user do next, and can they do it without doubt? The work that mattered most was not visual polish — it was reducing uncertainty at decision points. This project reminded me that product work is often quiet. The biggest wins came from removing friction, not adding features, and building a system the team could maintain after the sprint ended.
When your audience arrives with urgency, predictability becomes kindness — and kindness becomes conversion.
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