1:1 Merchandising with Abound
Personalized, curated, online shopping sessions
Year, Duration
2022, 2 months
Role
Product Designer
About
This project was for Abound (helloabound.com), a tech startup e-commerce wholesale site. Abound’s mission is to help local businesses (brands and retailers) connect, grow, and delight customers through its easy-to-use platform. Merchandising with Abound was a newly developed program that allowed retailers to shop with experts online – creating a personalized, custom shopping experience.
Team
Product Designer (me)
Product Manager
Engineers
Skills
UI/UX Design
Prototyping
Wireframing
Project summary
I was the lead product designer of designing the Merchandising Landing Page. This new program acted as a major differentiator from our largest competitor, Faire. Through user interviews and feedback from our CX, we discovered retailers had trouble finding products they were looking for on our site. Our newly added Retail Success Team found that many retailers enjoyed finding products 1:1 with them, which led to the creation of this landing page.
ISSUE AT HAND
How can we increase sales and retention of retailers when they are having trouble finding products on our site?
RESEARCH & PROCESS
My first step was to find inspiration from other e-commerce sites that use Personal Shopping, one in particular I looked at was Amazon’s program. They have a personal shopping program where you take their style quiz and they’ll send you clothes based off of that test. Ours acted differently since we were helping retailers shop for their store, not themselves so we thought a 1:1 video call was the best method of helping retailers shop.
After collecting inspiration, I start sketching different layouts for a landing page. I start by highlighting key information we want to point out, then drawing how to represent these points in a visual way, either with iconography or graphics.
I worked closely with my project manager to make sure we were highlighting the right points and editing copy along the way. After having a basic outline, I conducted user interviews to receive retailers’ feedback on the product.
01. GOAL
To make the shopping experience feel more personal
Customer service has always been Abound’s strong point – it’s what keeps retailers coming back to our site. If we can create a personal shopping experience that helps retailers find products more easily, then it’ll keep them returning and re-purchasing those same products.
02. CHALLENGE
Retailers don't have the time to spend browsing through pages of products
Many retailers weren’t responding to emails about personal shopping even though there was interest in the program. Time is very valuable to our retailers and they were concerned it would take up too much of their time.
03. SOLUTION
A personal shopping experience that is quick, easy, and seamless
Create a straightforward landing page where retailers could easily sign-up and scan to learn more about the program. We pushed that this 1-time consultation could save time and money overtime.
LOW TO HIGH FIDELITY WIREFRAMES
After drawing some rough sketches, I move over to Procreate to outline the different sections needed. Once I figure out the layout I want, I move to Figma and continue to add more details where I can.
FEEDBACK FROM USER INTERVIEWS
"The CTAs are a bit confusing... Not sure what would happen when I click on a button... Would I get an email?"
"I love the Meet the Team section... It would be great to be able to book an appointment with someone from there."
KEY DESIGN DECISIONS
Clearer, more descriptive CTAs
From user interviews, we realized that CTAs needed to be clearer - what exactly happens when you click on a button? For us it was obvious, but not to someone seeing this landing page for the first time. We gave users another option besides just opting in so that they might be more inclined to join a session.
Adding personal touches and CTAs to the Meet the Team section
From user interviews, we realized that CTAs needed to be clearer - what exactly happens when you click on a button? For us it was obvious, but not to someone seeing this landing page for the first time. We gave users another option besides just opting in so that they might be more inclined to join a session.
FINAL DESIGN
A personalized landing page experience for retailers
The final 1:1 Merchandising landing page provides users with a tailored, curated experience to book an appointment with a shopping expert.
LEARNINGS
We didn’t have enough retailers interested in personal shopping for us to ship this product, so instead we made a modal pop-up in the checkout order flow.
From user interviews, we gathered that while this page was very straightforward to retailers, the CTAs were confusing of where they would lead to. The most enjoyed part was the “Meet the Team” section because it was important to retailers to be able to connect with their personal shopper.
I think we should have gained more interest for personal shopping before creating a landing page. While landing pages are useful, they can be difficult to direct users to, whereas a pop-up is much quicker to ship and easier to gage interest.