Next Door Solutions to Domestic Violence
We redesigned Next Door Solutions’ website to make help easier to find and the first visit feel more welcoming.
The TL;DR
Next Door Solutions to Domestic Violence (NDS) is a nonprofit that has served survivors of domestic violence and their families in Santa Clara County since 1971. Its services include a 24/7 hotline, emergency shelter, legal and housing advocacy, counseling, and support groups. In fiscal 2025–2026, NDS reports serving 1,949 survivors and family members and answering 12,918 hotline calls. A website serving that community deserves the same care in how it welcomes people and helps them find support. We brought the hotline and chat into immediate view, organized services around what people need, and developed a warmer visual identity. The new Webflow site launched in October 2026, during Domestic Violence Awareness Month, with direct routes to help, practical privacy features, and a structure the NDS team can keep current.
The Challenge
Make Help Easy to Find and Approachable to Ask For
People arrive at a domestic violence organization’s website with different needs. Some are looking for urgent help. Others are still making sense of their experience, exploring housing or legal support, or looking for a support group. They may have limited time or privacy to look.
NDS’s old website made visitors work through crowded navigation to find the right resource. Our challenge was to make the next step clear while creating a calmer, more welcoming experience. A survivor should be able to reach help directly or explore their options at their own pace.
The site also needed to support the people who sustain that care. Donors, volunteers, and community partners needed clear ways to contribute, and NDS staff needed a practical way to keep service information current.
The Journey
Bringing Warmth Into the Brand
Discovery gave us three criteria for the design: clear and guided, calm and survivor-centered, and useful and approachable. We used them to connect the visual direction to how NDS wanted to welcome people.
We explored mood boards with the team and developed a direction that combined light, open layouts with a stronger use of color. The selected direction centered on purple, with deeper shades for emphasis and warm gold for accents. Figtree brought a friendly, readable typeface to headings and longer passages. Soft textures and sections that flow into one another gave the pages a less rigid feel.
We set aside a more patterned background direction after the team raised concerns about text being harder to read. We gave text room on open backgrounds and used illustrations to guide attention. Warmth and legibility had to work together so people could feel welcomed and still find what they needed.
Putting the Next Step Within Reach
We organized the homepage around two direct choices: getting help and getting involved. Someone seeking support can go straight to the help page, while a donor or volunteer has a separate route into supporting the organization.
The Get Help page puts phone and chat options first. We deliberately kept its layout open and left out an additional decorative illustration so those actions could stand out. On service pages, quick facts and a table of contents help people find an answer before reading the fuller explanation of a program.
We also gave frequently requested resources clearer routes. Peaceful Contact workshops received a place in the navigation after the team described calls from people struggling to find them. The choices came from listening to what visitors were trying to do and where the existing site was getting in their way.
Illustrating Support With Familiar Objects
For the service illustrations, we wanted visitors to recognize the kind of support available without depicting individual survivors. Watercolor textures, ink-style linework, and warm gold washes brought softness to the pages.
We developed the direction with NDS leadership, replacing early leaf motifs with doors and windows that connect to the organization’s name and suggest a welcoming place to turn. Service illustrations use familiar objects: a phone for immediate help, a mug for support groups, a door for housing and legal services, and a notebook for prevention and education.
The images give each service a recognizable visual cue without identifying the people who use it. After launch, Jonathan Darr, NDS’s director of development, said the site “loads so fast” and praised how the illustrations tied the brand together.
The Solution
Keeping Help and Privacy in View
The shared header brings the hotline, Safe Chat, and Exit Site together, with Get Help in the main navigation. Visitors can reach those options as they explore the site instead of returning to the homepage to find them.
Privacy also shaped the contact experience. The Get Help form asks how someone prefers to be contacted and whether it is safe to leave a voicemail or message. It identifies the form as a place for non-urgent requests and points people who need immediate support to the hotline.
The Exit Site control opens Google. The site also explains its limit: leaving the page does not erase browsing history.
Helping People Find and Understand the Available Support
The language selector offers English, Spanish, Tagalog, and Vietnamese through Weglot. Separate contact tabs distinguish help requests from media, giving, volunteering, and other inquiries, so visitors can start with the form that fits their reason for reaching out.
We also considered how people would discover NDS through search and AI tools. Our SEO and GEO work included a descriptive page title, metadata, structured data, and FAQs on the Get Help page to explain its support options clearly.
Keeping Service Information Current
A useful website has to keep pace with the organization behind it. We built reusable Webflow CMS templates for services and other recurring content, so staff can update program details within a consistent page structure.
We trained the NDS team in Webflow and provided a written website guide and brand package. The site lives in NDS’s own workspace, giving the team a practical foundation for maintaining its services, stories, and resources as its work continues.
Hear What Our Client Has To Say
“you all really dug into, like, what are they trying to do and why? And that alone, I think, was really impressive.”
FAQs
Next Door Solutions to Domestic Violence is a nonprofit serving survivors and their families across Santa Clara County. Founded in 1971, NDS provides a 24/7 hotline, emergency shelter, legal and housing advocacy, counseling, and other support. Its website is a place to understand those options and take a first step toward help.
Slam Media Lab is a San Francisco Bay Area branding and web design agency that carries strategy through design, development, and launch. For NDS, that meant connecting a warm visual identity with clear routes to services, thoughtful contact options, and a website staff can maintain. Our work with Equis Labs also shows how we bring brand identity and Webflow design together for organizations serving their communities.
Start with what visitors need to do, then design the brand and pages around those needs. For NDS, purple, warm gold, and watercolor illustrations bring warmth, while readable type and open space give essential information room to stand out. The hotline and Safe Chat stay visible in the shared header, and the Get Help page puts contact options first. Each choice supports a visitor who may need help quickly or want time to understand their options.
The NDS website includes an Exit Site control and explains that it does not erase browsing history. The Get Help form asks visitors how they prefer to be contacted and whether it is safe to leave a message. Custom service illustrations communicate support without identifying the survivors who use it. These decisions bring privacy considerations into the design and give visitors more choice about how they reach out.
A nonprofit team needs the tools and knowledge to keep service information current. For NDS, we provided reusable Webflow CMS templates, staff training, a written website guide, and a brand package. The site lives in NDS’s own Webflow workspace. When choosing an agency, ask what your team can update, what training you will receive, and who will own the website after launch.
Sparked Your Curiosity?
Read more of our case studies and learn about how we slam, so you can jam.
.webp)
Let’s Make Something Amazing!
We move fast. We pay attention to details, care about your work (we’re your first call when you need it the most). Our goal is to help you succeed.
Schedule a meeting — let's get the ball rolling!
