Case Study.

LIFE WADER | Natural England

Natural England is leading the LIFE WADER project, an initiative to restore fragile river, coastal, and marine ecosystems across the Northumberland Coast and Tweed catchment. The project tackles issues such as water pollution, invasive species, and climate change through innovative restoration strategies.

The Brief

To support this effort, Natural England needed a purpose-built website to serve as a central hub for stakeholder engagement, knowledge dissemination, and community involvement. The website was required to:

Communicate the project’s complex goals to diverse audiences, from conservationists and community groups to European peers.

Provide a platform for ongoing engagement, encouraging users to participate in events, access volunteer opportunities, and learn how to support habitat restoration.

Organise and present a wealth of resources, publications, and updates in a user-friendly manner.

Ensure the LIFE WADER team could easily update content to keep stakeholders informed throughout the project’s five-year active period and the subsequent five-year legacy phase.

Get in touch; we would love to hear about your organisation and its goals

The Solution

To address these challenges, we collaborated with Natural England to design and build an accessible, GDPR-compliant, and mobile-friendly website that meets the needs of stakeholders and users alike.

Stakeholder Engagement

The site was developed to foster collaboration, inspire involvement, and celebrate the work of LIFE WADER. The homepage features striking imagery, stats and current projects to immediately capture user interest, while intuitive navigation ensures visitors can quickly locate relevant information.

Key engagement features include:

Interactive ‘Get Involved’ section to connect users with volunteer opportunities.
Regular news updates to keep stakeholders up to date with the latest developments.
Event updates to provide details of upcoming events, workshops, and activities.

User Experience

Organising the vast volume of information required a strategic approach to site structure and layout.

Resource Hub: A centralised repository for downloadable publications, guides, and citizen science checklists.
Media Galleries: Dedicated pages for high-quality images and videos, highlighting the beauty of the habitats and restoration efforts.
Team and Partners: Profiles and contact details for team members and project partners, fostering a sense of transparency and community.

The website was also rigorously tested across devices and browsers to ensure a seamless experience for all users.

Content Management

To enable the LIFE WADER team to independently manage the site, we implemented an open-source content management system (CMS) with user-friendly templates.

These templates allow the team to:

Easily upload new content, from blog posts and images to event details and volunteer applications.
Regularly update resources and publications without technical assistance.
Track site performance through integrated Google Analytics, helping the team assess engagement and refine outreach strategies.

Showcasing Great Work

The LIFE WADER website not only serves as an information hub but also as a powerful tool for storytelling.

The project’s achievements are brought to life through:

Compelling visuals that emphasise the beauty and importance of the habitats under restoration.
Partner and funder acknowledgements, reinforcing the collaborative effort behind the project.

Recognised Barriers

While designing the site, we addressed several challenges:

Accessibility: The site has been designed to be inclusive for a variety of users.
Ease of Navigation: Simplified menus and quick links enable users to find information without frustration.
Future-Proofing: The site is scalable, allowing for the addition of new content types, such as livestreams and blogs, as the project evolves.

Communicates the project's complex goals

Provides a resource hub for key stakeholders

Showcases the project's incredible work

The results

The LIFE WADER website has become a central hub for stakeholders, fostering a sense of community and shared purpose. It effectively highlights the project’s mission and impact while empowering users to engage with its work.

With its robust CMS, the LIFE WADER team can confidently manage and grow the site, ensuring it remains an active and vibrant resource throughout the project’s duration and beyond.

Natural England’s LIFE WADER website demonstrates how digital tools can enhance conservation efforts, inspiring audiences and supporting a collective drive toward ecological restoration.

MacMartin have done a fantastic job, your team have all been brilliant, friendly, efficient and professional and we love the site, as does everyone else who has now seen it and let us know. I wanted to thank you for taking this work on at short notice and a busy time for you and doing such a great job. Please convey our thanks to everyone at MacMartin who contributed.”