DACS

We rebuilt the DACS website around clear, accessible user journeys, integrating it with core systems via a robust middleware layer to guarantee data integrity and efficient workflows. Integrated services and adaptive forms capture cleaner, more usable information and drive commercial growth. The platform now actively supports organisational complexity and day-to-day operations with measurable results. 

Founded in 1984, DACS is a not-for-profit organisation supporting artists, artists’ estates, art licensors and other art market professionals. It acts as a trusted intermediary across copyright, licensing, resale royalties and image services — work that depends on accuracy, eligibility rules and careful handling of data.

Over time, DACS’s growth brought complexity. Each service was supported by specialist platforms and internal systems that functioned well in isolation, but were never designed to work together as a whole. The result was a fragmented experience that increasingly worked against both users and staff.

For users, the website had become a barrier rather than a guide. Artists, estates and licensing clients struggled to navigate unfamiliar terminology, understand subtle distinctions between services, and decide where they belonged before taking action. People frequently chose the wrong path, misunderstood processes, or submitted incomplete or ineligible requests — not through carelessness, but because the structure and language of the site made these actions unnecessarily hard.

Commercial services were particularly affected. DACS Images (an image search and licensing platform) sat on a separate domain with a different brand, making it harder to discover and disconnecting it from related licensing services.

Any opportunities to link services and systems together had been missed, compounding internal issues. Teams spent significant time correcting submissions, responding to follow-up questions, and manually moving information between disconnected systems. Workarounds became normalised and data quality suffered. The gap between DACS’s clear public mission — protecting artists’ rights and helping them earn a fair income — and the reality of how people experienced its services had grown too wide to ignore.

DACS needed a digital transformation that could bring clarity to users, reduce friction in operations, and connect systems, content and services into a coherent whole.

Our first priority was clarity: helping people understand where to start, which services applied to them, and what would happen next. This work was grounded in usability testing with artists, estate managers and licensing clients, using interactive prototypes to complete realistic tasks such as checking ARR eligibility, finding copyright guidance, or starting a licensing request.

Observing where users hesitated or selected the wrong path gave clear evidence of where language, structure and signposting were failing. Those insights directly shaped navigation, content hierarchy and page layouts, following how users interpreted information instead of structures.

We replaced static forms with adaptive journeys that respond to user input, reducing completion time, preventing inappropriate submissions, and signposting users to alternative routes when DACS is not the right organisation to help.

Accessibility and usability were addressed together. Following WCAG standards, we prioritised plain language, consistent patterns and reduced cognitive load. Key processes were redesigned as step-by-step flows with progress indicators, validation and clear confirmation messaging.

The result is an experience that supports confident self-selection and reflects real users’ mental models, while still aligning with the realities of DACS’s services.

A significant part of the work focused on how DACS’s digital services connect behind the scenes. We carried out a detailed technical review of existing platforms and data flows, identifying where systems duplicated effort, relied on manual intervention, or constrained both operational efficiency and user experience.

At the centre of the solution was a more cohesive architecture that connects data through a robust middleware layer. We designed the website as an active part of DACS’s operational workflow, shaping, validating and routing information before it reached internal teams. Requests such as registrations, licensing submissions and sales reporting are now captured once, checked for completeness, and committed safely to core systems. This reduces data loss, provides visibility when issues occur, and removes the need for follow-up work and manual workarounds.

Strong technical foundations also enabled significant improvements to the user experience. By consolidating artist and artwork data from multiple systems into a single structured layer, the rebranded DACS Images brought search, selection, purchase and licensing into a single, coherent journey.

Together, these changes strengthened DACS’s operations while directly supporting commercial growth. The platform is more resilient, more scalable, and better able to support complex services, without exposing that complexity to the people using it.

The outcome of our deep collaboration with DACS is a consolidated platform that puts users first and supports how the organisation works today.

• Users are now guided more confidently to the right services.
• Commercial services are easier to discover and engage with.
• Internal teams receive cleaner, more actionable data.

The site has moved from being a fragmented system at risk of becoming an operational liability to a trusted, efficient cornerstone of day-to-day operations and commercial activity.