Guidance that moves with you.
Relaunching OptionB.Org with one human, evidence-based, hopeful, compassionate voice.
Client
After the death of her husband, Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook's former COO, wrote Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy, a primer for those who are bereaved, to help them recover, push on, and ultimately bounce back. Option B came with a web initiative launched by the Sheryl Sandberg & Dave Goldberg Family Foundation—OptionB.Org. Rich in educational resources, it aimed at supporting people and their community, mainly through the lens of grief.
Overview
When I started working with OptionB.Org, Sheryl and the team knew who they were and what they believed in, but weren’t yet expressing it clearly. Together, we refocused their value proposition around helping individuals build resilience more broadly. With that aligned, we:
defined OptionB.Org’s target audience
created a new user-informed brand framework
rebuilt with personalization and customization at the core
ROLE
Product Designer responsible for discovery, insight, strategy, and design. OptionB.Org hard launched in 2022.
IMPACT
User engagement more than doubled
TEAM
Sheryl Sandberg, Founder
Rachel Thomas, CEO
Jordan Miller-Surratt, Product Manager
Emma Spitzer, Illustrator
TOOLS
Asana, Figma, Getty Images, Google Analytics/Docs, Slack, SurveyMonkey, Whimsical, Zoom
Why the strategic shift to general resilience?
-
By broadening the entry point to hardship, the program becomes relevant to more people, more often.
-
It also enhances our relevance at pivotal cultural moments, allowing us to be a voice in destigmatizing human struggle when users need it most.
-
General resilience is at the heart of the book’s purpose: of its 51 key concepts, 46 center on building it
CORE AUDIENCE
CORE AUDIENCE
It all starts with knowing our audience, the beneficiary of everything we do. When we truly understand who we're speaking to, every word, every tone, and every message we share resonates more deeply.
We used a comprehensive community survey with 1000+ participants to bridge the gap between OptionB.Org's and their target audience's wants and needs. The resulting data revealed that 90% of the site's active user base consists of individuals personally experiencing some form of human struggle. While also shining a light on their defining characteristics:
Interested in resources to navigate hardship for themselves and, often, others
Searching for support through community (over 1 million strong)
Wants to feel validated, understood, and return to normalcy, even if it isn't Option A
REIMAGINING THE BRAND
REIMAGINING THE BRAND
We began to conceptualize how to best engage with our target audience and punctuate the inherent value that OptionB.Org can provide. With those intentions in mind, we decided to get back to basics, focus on reimagining the site's soul by fleshing out the humanity of its users.
After taking the time to understand the New Normal Seeker as accurately as possible, we got to know our brand, which laid the ground for the most impactful/memorable experience and ultimately relaunch.
BUILDING TOGETHER
BUILDING TOGETHER
We kicked off a highly collaborative ideation process to ensure our team was aligned on the future of OptionB.Org, working hand in hand to define its goals and potential.
Working toward a shared vision
The team constructed a Statement of Work encompassing the target audience, site's mission, objectives, pain points, UX must-haves, and deliverables. From our aggregate survey and analytics data, we focused on personalizing/customizing OptionB.Org's user experience to our target audience through new content hubs and a total resource audit (resulting in more relevant tags). Content outlines were then created and collectively iterated upon through live feedback sessions, developing into expanded copy docs.
Content determining design
We rendered these copy docs as digital sketches which, of course, became wireframes, enabling the team to stay agile. These straightforward, rudimentary designs provided room for extensive experimentation, giving way to a field of fresh, outstanding solutions.
Defining the system
From there, we began crafting and documenting a simple, scalable design system, thoughtfully leveraging color, iconography, and typography.
THE FINAL DESIGNS
THE FINAL DESIGNS
We created a site that finally felt built for the people it serves: more empathetic, easier to navigate, and grounded in real user needs. We introduced life-situation content hubs, added smart recommendations to surface relevant resources and community stories, refined the tone and pacing to gently invite exploration, and made the interface feel more like a supportive companion than a content library.
THE LAUNCH
THE LAUNCH
After a year of unprecedented collaboration, we created a best-in-class digital product that universally describes what we believe, how we think, operate, and, of course, what we offer. Most importantly, the experience felt human and supportive; we weren’t designing for clicks but to meet people where they were and walk with them for a little while.
OptionB.Org hard launched in 2022, more than doubling engagement.