Cuerva

Cuervá, the Granada-based energy company, is a family business with over 80 years of experience and global presence. They work in the generation, distribution, and commercialization of energy from renewable sources, committed from the start to innovation and taking energy to the next level.

It's been very important and very rewarding for us to accompany them on their journey these past few months. It all started with the reinvention of their brand identity to reflect their reality and potential. This led us to redesign their website so their digital presence would showcase what this new chapter means for Cuervá. In the end, "redesign" wasn't enough of a word for us… we took the website to the next level.

BEYOND REDESIGN: THE WEB EXPERIENCE

To make the first decisions, we went back, as always, to Brand Strategy and the business objective they laid out for their website: sector positioning. We crystallized it by defining a tangible purpose for developing the digital experience. Two purposes, actually: education, with a commitment to helping users, from their expertise, in the transition toward the new energy consumption model; and community, the website as the center of the Cuervá Community, to help it grow.

From there, we started thinking about the web differently, moving beyond the corporate. To do this, we searched for a conceptual foundation that would give us room to soar: Cuervá's web would be an inspiration platform to take energy to the next level. Clearly, this went (far) beyond a redesign. We transformed the visuals, the content, the way of navigating, and ultimately created a new web experience to let that inspiration flow.

SIMPLIFY NAVIGATION, IMPROVE EXPERIENCE

In the reference research phase, we adopted a fundamental insight to develop this new web experience: the current trend in tech websites to simplify information and navigation. To do this, we dismantled the section structure and proposed the content blocks that should exist in each section. In a workshop with the Cuervá team, we were able to define what was relevant, and with their input, we created the definitive web architecture.

With the focus on sharing knowledge and building community, we saw the need to incorporate a new section with stories, expert interviews, tutorials, innovation, projects… And so the new Community section was born.

LET THE DATA SPEAK

A very powerful idea, but… how does this translate to a web? We displayed real data in a highly visual way and created original Cuervá content about their projects, their impact, and relevant industry trends.

Beyond the new organization of content, we were very clear that to maintain coherence, the web—the renewed core of their digital communication—couldn't tell what Cuervá is, but rather had to show what it does.

VISUAL SYSTEM

The brand's visual universe—its colors (yellow, gray, and white), typography, energetic and dynamic photographic style—was key to making this new web experience shine. That's why an important part of the process was adapting this universe to Cuervá's new digital product while maintaining its essence. We worked on all this using our Design System, which lets us create more consistent interfaces, improve workflows across different teams, and optimize time and resources for publishing and iterating.

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In Cuervá's case, the styles defined in this Design System are easily shared across products without requiring intervention from the technology or design team. Anyone in contact with the brand can do it easily thanks to its Brand Center. We'll show you soon how this process went and the final result—that's a whole separate story.

The use of Cuervá's own colors plays a starring role on the new website. We use them in different percentages to communicate the two main sections of the site: dark for the corporate section and light for the community web. We also use yellow in a smaller percentage (15%) for calls to action.

THE TECHNOLOGY BEHIND THE INSPIRATION PLATFORM

All the components developed in the Design System move quickly and easily to the development team, enabling agile programming thanks to shared nomenclature.

Another key piece was total integration and customization with Cuervá's marketing tools and CRM. This gives us data that lets us measure content effectiveness and the different website sections, and make necessary adjustments. On top of that, Cuervá's Marketing team manages everything smoothly from HubSpot, and on our end, with DatoCMS.

RESULTS

And there was light. The new inspiration platform to take energy to the next level is now a reality. The project's pace was very agile, so we decided to publish the website in successive releases: first we launched the home, a one-scroll page, then came the Services section, the Cuervá section, the I+P section (Innovation and People), and finally, the Community web. This agile process let us measure and adjust what was needed between launches.

Beyond the simplicity of navigation, photography is an essential element of Cuervá's online presence, just as it was of its visual brand identity. Striking photographs that capture us from the web heroes.

Another key piece we find on the page, even overlaid on the images, are the context components that reinforce the concept of knowledge and the principle of showing what we do: company timeline, real project data, graphics that simplify information…

COMMUNITY

The approach to outreach and community building is also very present through content, especially on the Community web section. In this area we've defined the content structure through categories, and we continue to actively participate through the co-creation of articles and interviews.

Cuervá's new web platform is a living project and after these intense months we already feel part of their team. New needs are currently emerging in the Marketing department and we continue working hand in hand with them, sharing this new chapter with enthusiasm. And there we'll stay, always pushing one step further.