Janes Patisserie Website

Clean design, faster load and easy-to-use website has helped top blogger and Sunday Times bestseller to elevate her brand.

The challenge

Jane Dunn is an Instagram sensation, best-selling food writer, photographer and blogger. She has run her blog, Jane’s Patisserie, since November 2014, after training at Ashburton Chefs Academy in Devon. Her blog was voted the top baking blog of 2020 by Vuelio, and her recipes have been featured in Cosmopolitan and Baking Heaven Magazine. In 2021, her debut book, Jane’s Patisserie, became the fastest-selling baking book ever, selling more than 44,000 copies in its first three days after publication.

As her popularity grew, Jane realised she needed to redesign, redevelop and relaunch her nearly 10-year-old website. But where to start? Jane had many requirements, including:

  • Design: the site’s aesthetics, look and feel.
  • Development: build and maintenance – the work that happens behind the scenes to make a website look great, work fast and perform well with a seamless user experience (UX).
  • Going live: supporting the new site with digital marketing at its heart.

In June 2021, web design south west consultant KW Marketing was referred to Jane for this project. Working with a reliable and trustworthy team of web design Exeter experts, we were thrilled to collaborate on the huge task. Jane knew that the content she was putting out on her blog was valuable, but an unwieldy content management system, a lack of key usability features, a super-slow load time and woolly SEO (search engine optimisation) meant that her site wasn’t working hard enough. She also wanted to refresh the general design and feel, aligning it with her new branding.

The solution

Jane approached us with one goal in mind: to relaunch her website. However, during our discovery call, we quickly uncovered other core issues that were negatively impacting Jane’s ability to keep existing readers and increasing the bounce rate (the percentage of visitors that leave a webpage without taking an action, such as clicking on a link, filling out a form or making a purchase). Jane booked in, and we got to work on tailoring our solution to her needs. We improved the look and feel of the site as well as enhancing the UX, choosing an easy-to-use platform that ensured speedy load times. All changes were seamlessly integrated so there were no technical or system complications.

The scale of this project meant we took a pragmatic approach and, from start to finish, it was crucial that the finer details were tested and ticked off. Working closely with Jane enabled us to build a website that not only helped her overcome her challenges to reduce bounce rate but also inspire more people to read her blog and build her community by improving UX. Just six weeks after we started working together, we delivered a new and improved janespatisserie.com, which not only wows readers but is also a breeze to manage.

The impact

Within the first month of Jane launching her site, janespatisserie.com has seen a substantial increase in user traffic and book sales. The increase is down to our user-centred approach to design, such as an easy-to-search recipe section, a beautiful blog and improved load times.

  • 10.51% increase in traffic
  • 0.83% in-session duration
  • 2.21% reduction in bounce rate
  • Streamlined content management
  • Improved user satisfaction

Launching a new website is only the first step in Jane’s digital marketing journey! KW Marketing is now working with Jane on creating effective lead magnets – a free resource to attract potential readers to her blog, in exchange for their email address. This feeds into her wider email marketing strategy, focusing on growing her subscriber database and empowering future communications by crafting targeted automated email sequences to keep her community aware of her latest content.

Scope of work

Discovery

  • Discovery call: we found out what Jane needed and established how we could deliver the goods.
  • Research: we used Google Analytics, G Metrics and SEO tools to check out the existing site to see what was working and what wasn’t.

Design

  • Wireframing: we established the site’s basic structure before visual design and content was added.
  • UX: we took into account user needs and user journeys.
  • Design: we made it fun but also functional.

Develop

  • Back-end development: we created the site’s ‘behind the scenes’ functionality.
  • Front-end development: we created everything that users see visually.
  • Systems integration: we ensured a smooth transition between the new site and the old site.

Launch

  • SEO: we improved the site to increase its visibility.
  • Testing: we thoroughly checked functionality.
  • Sign off: all the little details were ticked off.
  • GO LIVE: does what it says on the tin!

‘It’s always lovely to work with Kate – she is very knowledgeable and has many amazing ideas to help! Love her work!’

Jane Dunn, blogger, food writer and author, Jane’s Patisserie

Want results like this? Book a call today to chat about how a revamped website can take your business to the next level.