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Case № 24

Real cloud.

Carbon60 is one of Canada's leading managed cloud and managed WordPress hosting companies. The corporate identity and the website both needed to grow up at the same time.

Client Carbon60
Industry Software & Technology
Role Brand Strategy, Custom Logo Design
Live at www.carbon60.com
Carbon60 hero
In short

Cloud hosting website design.

Carbon60 had been running on a brand and a marketing site that the company had outgrown. The company name comes from the Carbon60 molecule, a structure known for stability, flexibility, and efficiency, and the original identity had leaned on that idea since the company started. The team wanted to keep the molecule story (it was load-bearing inside the company culture) and rebuild everything around it so the brand could carry the company into a more competitive enterprise hosting market and a managed WordPress offering they were beginning to lean into harder.

I led the complete corporate rebrand and the custom website redesign. New logo, new typographic system, a refreshed color palette that bridged the company toward the WordPress ecosystem they were now selling into, a restructured site so each managed service had its own story, and a search foundation tuned for the queries enterprise hosting buyers actually run. The work was done in collaboration with Carbon60's long-standing digital marketing partner so the brand and the campaigns landed at the same time.

This case study walks through how the brand was rebuilt, how the site was restructured, and what it does for the buyer today.

Full
Rebrand logo + visual system
Service-first
Architecture page per offering
Responsive
Rebuild previously was not
Ongoing
Optimization data-driven tuning
01 / The Problem

What was broken.

The first challenge was a brand that had served the company for years and was deeply tied to the founding story. The Carbon60 molecule had become the visual anchor everyone inside the company recognized, and the rebrand had to honor that without keeping anything that was holding the company back. A clean break was off the table. A polish job was not enough.

The second was the buyer mix. Carbon60 was selling into enterprise IT teams, into WordPress agencies who needed a serious managed host, and into developers who cared about uptime and platform engineering. Each of those buyers needed a different conversation, but the previous site collapsed all three into a single hosting page that did not really speak to any of them.

The third was performance. The site was not mobile-friendly, the architecture was working against the search visibility the company wanted, and the marketing team did not have the tooling to keep the site current as the product offering evolved. The rebuild had to fix all three at once.

02 / The Approach

How it got fixed.

I started with the brand strategy. The molecule was the anchor, so I rebuilt the visual system around it rather than away from it. The new logo is a cleaner, more confident expression of the molecule. The type pairing is professional without leaning sterile. The color palette walked from the original burning orange toward a more familiar WordPress-leaning blue, with a supporting burnt orange that kept the original brand DNA in the system. The result reads more mature and more confident, which was the brief.

From there I restructured the site so each managed service has its own page and each buyer finds their own conversation in the first scroll. Managed cloud, managed WordPress, cloud security, and the other specialized services each got their own surface so a buyer searching for any of them lands on a page that answers their question directly. About and culture moved into a quieter supporting role.

The site was rebuilt fully responsive (the previous site was not), with a customer journey designed for technical buyers who scan first and read second. Calls to action are placed where each buyer is actually ready to engage. The search foundation was rebuilt against the queries enterprise and managed WordPress buyers actually run, and the team started collecting data the day the site launched so we could keep tuning it.

01

Brand strategy anchored on the molecule

I worked with the Carbon60 leadership team and their digital marketing partner to redefine the brand strategy without losing the molecule story that had anchored the company since launch. The output was a positioning brief that the new logo, the visual system, and the site all tied back to.

02

Custom logo and visual system

I rebuilt the logo as a cleaner expression of the Carbon60 molecule. The type pairing reads professional and modern, the color palette walks from the original orange toward a WordPress-leaning blue with supporting burnt orange, and the system was designed to scale across the marketing site, sales material, and the partner ecosystem.

03

Service-first site structure

I restructured the site so each managed service (managed cloud, managed WordPress, cloud security, the other specialized offerings) has its own page targeted at its own buyer. The architecture was designed so a buyer searching for a specific service lands on a page that answers their question directly.

04

Responsive rebuild

The previous site was not mobile-friendly. The new site is fully responsive, fast, and built so a technical buyer on a phone in a server room gets the same experience as a buyer at a desk.

05

Search foundation and ongoing optimization

I rebuilt the search foundation around the queries enterprise hosting and managed WordPress buyers actually run. Per-page metadata, clean semantic markup, and a content structure that supports ongoing optimization. The team started collecting performance data the day the site launched.

How it shipped

The work, step by step.

01

Brand strategy for a managed cloud hosting company

Rebrands that ignore the founding story almost always lose something the company values. Carbon60's molecule was load-bearing inside the company culture, so the rebrand kept it as the anchor and rebuilt around it. The new logo is a cleaner expression of the same idea. The type pairing reads professional. The color system walks toward a WordPress-leaning blue without losing the original orange entirely. The result reads more mature, more confident, and easier to sell into enterprise IT and managed WordPress buyers.

02

User experience design for technical buyers

Enterprise hosting buyers do not browse the way consumer buyers do. They scan, they verify, and they compare. I designed the architecture so each service has its own page with the technical detail (uptime, security posture, platform engineering, support model) up front rather than buried. Calls to action sit where each buyer is actually ready to engage. About and culture moved into a quieter supporting role so they support the sale rather than slowing it down.

03

Service-first site structure for cloud hosting

The previous site collapsed every offering into a single hosting page. The new site treats each managed service as its own surface. Managed cloud has its own page targeted at enterprise IT. Managed WordPress has its own page targeted at agencies and serious WordPress operators. Cloud security gets its own dedicated story. Each surface answers the question the buyer landed with rather than forcing them to read the whole company first.

04

Responsive web design for cloud hosting

The previous site was not mobile-friendly, which had become a real liability. The new site was rebuilt fully responsive with a layout system tuned for technical readers who scan on every device. Specifications, pricing, support detail, and contact paths all work on a phone the way they work on a desktop. Performance was tightened so first paint is fast and the buyer can move quickly.

05

Search optimization for enterprise hosting queries

I rebuilt the search foundation around the queries enterprise hosting and managed WordPress buyers actually run. Per-page metadata, clean semantic markup, and an architecture where each service page maps to a real buyer query rather than a generic hosting search. The team started collecting performance data the day the site launched so the search foundation could be tuned over time.

06

Custom WordPress development for a managed hosting buyer

Hosting buyers can spot a templated site instantly. The brand had to demonstrate the same craft and rigor Carbon60 was selling. I built the site on a custom WordPress install with bespoke templates, modular blocks for the marketing team to run themselves, and a publishing tool that stays light by avoiding heavy third-party plugins. The build was performance-tested across the same kind of geographies the company hosts in, so the marketing site would never become evidence against the hosting story it was selling.

The Work, Specifically

What I actually shipped.

Not a services list. The real work streams, in the order I ran them.

  1. № 01

    Brand strategy

    I worked with the Carbon60 leadership team and their digital marketing partner to redefine the brand without losing the molecule story. The output was a positioning brief every downstream decision tied back to.

  2. № 02

    Custom logo design

    A cleaner, more confident expression of the Carbon60 molecule. Designed to scale from the marketing site to sales material to the partner ecosystem.

  3. № 03

    Visual system

    Type pairing, color palette walked from the original orange toward a WordPress-leaning blue with supporting burnt orange, and a photography and iconography direction. Designed to read mature and professional across every surface.

  4. № 04

    Service-first site structure

    Each managed service (cloud, WordPress, security, the specialized offerings) has its own page targeted at its own buyer. About and culture moved into a quieter supporting role.

  5. № 05

    Responsive web design

    Fully responsive build tuned for technical buyers who scan on every device. Specifications, pricing, support detail, and contact paths all work on a phone the way they work on a desktop.

  6. № 06

    Search foundation and ongoing tuning

    Per-page metadata, clean semantic markup, and an architecture aligned with the queries enterprise hosting and managed WordPress buyers actually run. The team started collecting data the day the site launched, and the search foundation has continued to produce because the structure was built to be tuned over time rather than locked at launch.

  7. № 07

    Custom WordPress publishing tool

    A custom WordPress install with bespoke templates, modular blocks the marketing team can reorder and refill, and a publishing tool that stays light by avoiding heavy third-party plugins. The build was performance-tested across the same kind of geographies the company hosts in, so the marketing site does not become evidence against the hosting story it is selling.

03 / The Work

What shipped.

The Carbon60 homepage, post-rebrand.

The Carbon60 homepage, post-rebrand.

Carbon60, Service-first architecture across the site. (desktop)
Carbon60, Service-first architecture across the site. (mobile)

Service-first architecture across the site.

Carbon60 — view 1
Carbon60 — view 2
Carbon60 — view 3

Across cloud, services, and the sales touchpoints.

Nick led a complete overhaul of our corporate identity, logo, and website. He took the time to understand our company, our culture, and the molecule that has anchored our brand from the start, and he turned it into a brand and a site that finally reflects who we are. The result is a more confident, mature presence that has helped us compete for the kind of business we want.
Carbon60 Marketing Team Marketing Leadership, Carbon60
04 / The Outcome

Where it landed.

The new Carbon60 brand and site launched as a more confident, more mature presence in the managed cloud and managed WordPress markets. The molecule is still the anchor (the team and the customer base both wanted that), but the visual system, the architecture, and the search foundation have all moved forward.

The service-first architecture means a buyer searching for managed WordPress, managed cloud, or cloud security lands on a page that speaks their language and gives them the proof they need. The responsive rebuild brought the experience up to date for technical buyers who do not buy from a desktop anymore. The search foundation has continued to produce because the team collects performance data and tunes the site against it.

The shift toward managed WordPress hosting was a particular win. The color and tone walk toward the WordPress ecosystem opened up conversations with WordPress agencies and serious WordPress operators that the previous brand had not really invited. The dedicated managed WordPress page, with the technical detail those buyers actually care about (uptime, support model, platform engineering, the migration path), did the heavy lifting on those conversations.

The collaboration with Carbon60's digital marketing partner kept the brand and the campaigns aligned at launch. The handoff worked because we structured the engagement so the brand and the campaigns could ship in the same moment rather than as two separate launches. The site has continued to be the foundation the marketing team builds on, and the system was designed so new services and new offerings can join the architecture without forcing a rebuild every time the company expands.

The Role
Brand Strategy Custom Logo Design Art Direction & Consulting Site Structure & Strategy User Experience Design Responsive Website Design
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