I’m Christine Benson, a UX Designer, Information Architect, and Content Strategist
For over 20 years I’ve helped organizations solve key problems by discovering, understanding, and designing the right information and processes to reach the people they need to connect with. My passions are diving deep, learning quickly, and using research to inform decisions.
What you get
From Fortune 100 companies to start-ups and small businesses, I work with organizations of all sizes across a variety of industries, including healthcare, fitness, retail, agriculture, higher education, school photography, hospital systems, and financial services.
Work often includes:
- Strategic content plans and objectives
- Information architecture and UX design
- Research, analysis, and user testing
- Content workflow and governance
- Content audits and measurement
- Content modeling and migration
- Personas, user flows, and journey maps
- Education, training, and workshops
Ways to work together
Whether you need someone to work independently or collaborate with a diverse team to get the job done, my experience includes a variety of engagement configurations. Based in Minneapolis, MN, I work with teams across the globe.
Project-based work
Have a specific UX problem you’re trying to solve or content issue you’re struggling with? Let’s collaborate and determine the right tasks, deliverables, and budget to get you to where you need to be.
Flexible team addition
Do you need help working through a backlog of tasks, extra help on a special project, or filling in for someone on leave? I’m open to semi- or completely-remote staffing contracts on a part or full-time basis, depending on availability.
Content-first website design
Looking to launch or redesign your website? Starting with the content is the best way to ensure success. I can help you get from planning to launch and connect you with any additional partners you might need along the way.
Select projects
Defined internal content processes for a financial services company
The client had multiple departments and teams creating and managing content ad hoc, but no universally shared content processes. Most planning and creation was happening in silos, limiting collaboration and effective use of talent. They recognized an opportunity to move away from decentralized efforts and toward a coordinated, strategic, and sustainable approach to analog and digital content. After extensive research, I created a content lifecycle process and toolkit designed to optimize existing workflows, support ongoing content measurement, and establish a content governance structure.
Designed multiple navigation and page-level content structures for a regional health and wellness organization
As the client’s organizational needs changed, so did the need to update the content within the existing global site navigation. Over a multi-year relationship, I redesigned and optimized the content structure for a variety of sections, each time balancing the target audience needs with organizational and technical requirements.
Designed a promotional content calendar for an international beauty brand
The client requested a promotional calendar to support planning, communicating and collaborating. The calendar needed to be accessible internally and by their licensed-salon partners, who are primarily on mobile devices. I created mobile and desktop wireframes with a variety of views based on user-types.
Led the intranet redesign for a nationally ranked healthcare system, consisting of four hospitals and multiple affiliated locations
After a multi-year relationship that included defining the content strategy, creating the materials for a distributed content audit, and managing the audit, the client was looking for someone to lead the content-focused aspects of an intranet redesign and content migration. The project included testing the redesigned navigation (created as part of the content strategy) with site users, collaborating with the internal team to resolve design and technical issues, planning the migration of the content to the new structure, and managing the overall timeline and project process. The project was successfully launched in less than five months.
Designed a content-centered user experience for a university extension department
Before migrating to a new content management system, the University of Minnesota Extension Yard and Garden department wanted to improve the content user experience to provide practical education and trusted research that helps people, businesses, and communities. Key audience needs and content objectives were defined and validated using stakeholder interviews and multiple user tests.
Created a customer-centric strategic plan and user experience resources for a national school photography company
The yearbook business for the client had fallen behind the competition and was lacking a clear vision for where to focus its resources. After extensive research, including heuristic analysis, user interviews and observations, and user surveys, I created a strategic plan prioritizing target markets and audiences, developed research-backed personas, and defined customer journey maps for each persona.
Information Architecture, Content Strategy and UX Design 