Excel4apps is a powerful program that puts real-time data into finance professionals’ tool of choice: Excel. However, the look and feel of the product had become dated, and was in need of a refresh to match both the style of Excel and the updated brand identity of Excel4apps.
We first created a vocabulary of repeating elements that would become familiar to users. The red squares in the corners communicate the action, while the blue component conveys the subject. The parts are reused and reconfigured to be consistent, while additional icons that don’t fit into these parameters were created as needed. This approach helped create a consistency across 500+ Icons.
In order to reduce the amount of information needed in the smaller dropdown icons, we took into account their placement within the menus of Excel. In most instances, it allowed us to remove the Action Icon, since the dropdown already specified the action.