Case study
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Hemi
The highest-value audience had no door to walk through.
Audit
UX
Art Direction
Dev
Web3
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DeFi
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Bitcoin
Bitcoin yield infrastructure for institutional capital. Rebuilt from the ground up.
Hemi is building Bitcoin yield infrastructure for institutions. $1.2B+ TVL, 90+ protocols, 100K+ users. Co-founded by Jeff Garzik, one of the original Bitcoin Core contributors and the person whose code now runs on every Android device and modern data center on Earth. Real traction. Genuine technical differentiation. A credible institutional opportunity.
The site was built for the team's own circle. Two competing homepage narratives lived on the same domain. The word "treasury-grade" appeared once, backed by nothing. An institutional CFO evaluating Hemi hit a dead end after eight steps. The highest-value audience was architecturally invisible.
Three months to fix it. Nine workstreams. A team of eight. I was the sole external lead — responsible for UX, copy direction, art direction, Framer build, and full team coordination, end-to-end from audit to deployed site.
About the client
Industry
Bitcoin L2 / Onchain Infrastructure
Stage
Pre-seed → Seed
Location
USA
Timeline
Oct – Dec 2025
Results
3 months
From kick-off to shipped website
0 critical
Issues remaining after redesign (down from 10)
-46%
Total issues reduced across the site
+40%
Documented strengths gained
The technology was institutional-grade. The site was not.
By the time the redesign started, Hemi had $1.2B+ TVL, 90+ protocols, and 100K+ users. The infrastructure was defensible. The technical moat was real. In any institutional conversation, Hemi could hold its own.
The site could not. Two competing hero narratives lived on the same domain: one for developers, one for yield-seekers, neither for institutions. No dedicated page, no audit reports, no compliance signals, no demo booking path. "Treasury-grade" was claimed once across the entire site, backed by nothing. The primary onboarding CTA? "Tunnel assets to Hemi" — infrastructure jargon for crypto-natives, invisible to the institutional evaluator sitting across the table. A CFO evaluating Hemi for treasury deployment would hit a dead end in eight steps and leave.
The challenge was not aesthetic. The architecture had to be rebuilt around who the site was actually trying to convert.
Old Hemi website
Nine workstreams. Three months. One governing principle: architecture first.
01
UX Audit
Full audit using a 4-block methodology. 69 issues identified, 10 critical. Every finding assigned severity level (Critical / High / Medium / Low), root cause, and specific recommendation. The audit became the project brief.
Block 1: Brand — positioning clarity, target audience definition, message hierarchy, tone of voice, brand story, competitive differentiation, brand promise consistency, emotional resonance (8 sub-sections)
Block 2: UX — website clarity (5-second test), user needs vs. site content, sitemap analysis, navigation vs. primary user paths, user flows across 3 audience segments, usability (6 sub-sections)
Block 3: UI — visual quality, composition, component consistency
Block 4: Conversion — copy quality, CTAs, SEO structure, blog positioning
02
User Flows
Mapped three primary journeys before touching the sitemap. Sequence matters: flows first, architecture second.
Institutional CFO evaluating Hemi for treasury deployment
EVM developer exploring Bitcoin L2 options
Crypto enthusiast looking to earn yield on BTC
03
Sitemap Redesign
Rebuilt the information architecture from page-based to audience-based.
Old nav: Resources / Developers / Ecosystem / About / Community / Store
New nav: Institutions / Developers / Ecosystem / About
Footer rebuilt as primary full-site navigation: Institutions / Developers / Users / Ecosystem / Company / Community — each section with dedicated sub-links and a conversion path
04
Wireframes + Functional Copy
Full wireframe set for all pages with real copy baked in from day one. No Lorem Ipsum. Every headline, subheadline, and CTA written at the wireframe stage — so the UI designer received frames ready to design, not frames waiting for content.
Homepage: "The unified DeFi layer for Bitcoin"
Institutions: "The institutional layer for Bitcoin capital deployment"
Developers: "Solidity on Bitcoin. No wrappers. No bridges."
Brand promise: "Architecture you can trust. Results you can verify."
05
Copy Coordination
Worked with Hemi's internal copywriter throughout. The tone shift from community-casual to institutional-competent required deliberate coordination at every level.
CTAs rewritten: "Tunnel assets to Hemi" → "Earn with Hemi" / "Book a demo"
Risk disclosures added site-wide: yields disclosed as variable, incentives time-stamped
Jeff Garzik bio rewritten for non-crypto audiences: "Code now embedded in every Android device and modern data center on Earth"
Blog repositioned: "Insights on Bitcoin Yield, Infrastructure & Institutional Adoption"
06
Art Direction
Directed three UI designers on all visual execution. The Hemi brand guide (V1.0 by Proof of Work Studio) was being created in parallel. My job was to ensure the site applied that system in a way that served the institutional claim — energy and infrastructure, calibrated for trust.
07
Framer Build
Led the Framer build working alongside a Framer designer and a Framer developer (who owned custom components). Responsible for layout, interactions, and responsive behavior across all pages. Coordinated with Hemi DevOps for deployment.
08
Blog Migration
Migrated 200+ existing articles to the new site structure. Updated blog positioning from community-casual to institutional-grade.
09
Team Coordination
Coordinated the full team of eight across parallel workstreams — maintaining alignment, tracking timeline, and keeping handoffs clean.
Three UI designers + Framer designer + Framer developer
Illustrators and motion designers
Hemi copywriter + Hemi DevOps + POW developer (brand guide)
From architecture to execution. Everything shipped.
Seven deliverables shipped over three months. Each one mapped to a gap identified in the audit: a missing audience path, an ambiguous narrative, or a page that could not support institutional evaluation.
Streamlined navigation
Old nav buried institutions under Resources. Rebuilt to four audience-first sections: Institutions, Developers, Ecosystem, About. Each with its own conversion path. Footer rebuilt as a full-site navigation system with six audience segments and sub-links.
New homepage
Replaced two competing hero narratives with one: The unified DeFi layer for Bitcoin. Architecture-first layout leads with product proof ($1.2B+ TVL, 90+ protocols, 100K+ users) before any marketing claim.
Dedicated institutions page
Built from scratch. Full evaluation path for institutional CFOs: yield mechanics, security infrastructure, compliance signals, risk disclosures, and a demo booking path. None of which existed before.
Rebuilt developers page
Solidity on Bitcoin. No wrappers. No bridges. Developer-specific onboarding with docs entry points, testnet access, protocol compatibility overview, and a clear answer to why Hemi before any technical detail.
Redesigned tokenomics page
hemiBTC narrative reframed as the foundational step toward productive Bitcoin. Not wrapped Bitcoin. Full yield mechanics explained for both institutional evaluators and retail participants.
Detailed About page
Jeff Garzik's credentials front and center. Team structure, technical lineage, advisory composition, and the founding story. Rebuilt for trust, not just familiarity.
Post-MVP sitemap
Full architecture plan for the next 6 months: additional institutional sub-pages, blog repositioning from community-casual to institutional thought leadership, and expanded conversion infrastructure.
The same product. Rebuilt for the audience that mattered most.
Three categories of change identified in the audit: messaging, copy, and user navigation. Every row maps to a specific finding. Every change has a documented reason.
Positioning
Before
After
Primary message
Two competing heroes
"The unified DeFi layer for Bitcoin"
Site-wide tagline
None
"The unified Bitcoin economy layer"
Audience messaging
None
Dedicated pages per segment
5-second test
Ambiguous
Clear
Copy
Before
After
Brand promise
"What they call the future, we call Hemi"
"Architecture you can trust. Results you can verify."
Product identity
"The Yield Machine"
"The institutional layer for Bitcoin capital deployment"
Primary CTA
"Tunnel assets to Hemi"
"Earn with Hemi" / "Book a demo"
Developer headline
Implied in tech sections
"Solidity on Bitcoin. No wrappers. No bridges."
Risk communication
Absent
Site-wide, time-stamped, yield-qualified
User paths
Before
After
Institutional evaluation
∞ steps, dead end
3–4 steps to demo booking
Developer exploration
5 steps, no "why Hemi"
3–4 steps with value prop answered
Retail yield onboarding
4+ steps, jargon barriers
2–3 steps, cleaner language
Every critical issue. Resolved.
69 issues identified in the audit. 10 critical, 25 high. After the redesign: 0 critical, high issues down 64%, total issues down 46%, documented strengths up 40%. The institutional audience finally had a full evaluation path. The brand made the same claim as the product.
Key achievements
01
Critical issues resolved. Down from 10 to 0 across the entire site.
02
Institutional evaluation flow rebuilt. From dead end in 8 steps to demo booking in 3.
03
Documented strengths grew from 47 to 66. A 40% increase across the site.
04
/institutions page, institutional deck, and L2 comparison table built from scratch. The highest-value audience had a full evaluation path for the first time.
05
Unified market presence established across web, partner marketing, and campaigns for the first time in Hemi's history.
06
Scalable brand system and content engine delivered. Built for continued institutional growth over the next 12 months.
100%
Critical issues fixed
46%
Total issues fixed in the MVP
+40%
Documented strengths
3 mo
Full scope delivery
Hemi
2025 Year in Review,
Hemi
"
Hemi rebuilt its digital presence to function as conversion infrastructure for institutional decision-makers. The new website was architected around how institutions actually evaluate Bitcoin infrastructure: audience-specific entry points, evidence-driven content hierarchy, and clear conversion paths from understanding to deployment. The site now functions as active business development infrastructure, supporting capital conversations, partnership evaluations, and institutional onboarding at the scale Hemi's growth demands.
Strategic note
This project sits at the intersection of two problems I see repeatedly in Web3.
The first: a technically excellent product with a site built for the team, not for the target audience. The team understood wallets, PoP mining, and EVM compatibility intuitively — so the site reflected that. The highest-value audience (institutional capital deployers) had no door to walk through.
The second: a brand promise that isn't backed by evidence on the site. "Treasury-grade" means nothing without audit reports. "Transparent" means nothing without yield dashboards. The old site made claims the content didn't support. The new site inverts this: every claim has a corresponding evidence page.
The redesign didn't change what Hemi is. It rebuilt the site so the people who most need to understand it can find, evaluate, and act on what they need.
Dmitry Chernov
Web & Product Architect
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AI, SaaS & Web3
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