overview
I was assigned a topic on optimizing the product discovery journey during my summer internship. Upon considering the topic, I realized that policy plays a vital role in product discovery for procurement. Therefore, I delved into this area and developed some concepts, which I will share below.
know the segments
Give people an idea of which products are recommended to request and which are not recommended to request by using colors and tags.
understand the policy
Provide people with the necessary product-related procurement policy information when they are interested in the product.
avoid mistakes
Automatically remind people if they trigger some policies.
the problem
Employee
Employees often have many questions about purchasing policies while browsing items. Currently, there is no place on the internal buying site's user interface to display necessary information. As a result, employees always have to ask their colleagues to ensure they don't make any mistakes. However, colleagues are not Google, so it is impossible for them to answer all the questions. Even Google probably cannot answer these questions either.
Company
Meanwhile, the company also feels very frustrated. They invest a lot of time and energy in creating buying policies and want their employees to learn and follow these policies. As a result, they even create a procurement policy document, but nobody reads it.
persona
Ariba is a product that is faced to many different user groups. In this project, I only focus on the casual buyer.
Target User
User Research & findings
Objective
- What extent people are familiar with the policy in their companies?
- How much does the policy influence people’s shopping behavior?
Method
- Walkthrough with in-depth interview.
Interviewee Profile
- 6 Casual Buyers
- Mix of Gender
- Positions: Full-time and Intern
- Vertical: IT
- Purchase Frequency: Around twice per year
- Profile: Designer, Software Engineer
- Product Used: Company Internal Portal and SAP Ariba
- Location: USA
Findings
- Most of the users don’t know the purchase policy of their company.
- People don’t know where to check those policies. (The information doesn’t show in the right place that they supposed to be.)
- The policy documents are TLDR. The users only expect bite size information.
- Knowing the policy can make people feel more confident when they make decisions.
- Most of the people assume others know the policies. (They want to be fed information)
- Users try to figure out the auto-approval upper limit. (By adding and deleting products)
- Communicate the policies clearly with users doesn’t motivate people to buy more goods.
- Company also feel frustrated about how to educate its employees to understand and follow the policy.
Product Opportunities from The findings
From the user research, I found that most people are not familiar with the procurement policy, and they have the needs to know the policy. Currently, people can only read the procurement policy pdf or ask their colleagues to know the policy. That's too complicated. Our opportunity will be to make those policies bite-size and integrate them into the UI.
Comparative Assessment
I have browsed many potential competitors, and these 6 products inspired me.
Google - Stuff
Google has an internal site called "Stuff" that allows its employees to order devices themselves. This portal offers a guided shopping experience that helps users to order items step by step. For example, when a user tries to order a new laptop, it will show if the user is eligible to refresh his device and then guide the user to go through the request process step by step.
Progressive - ChatBot
Progressive is an insurance company. It offers a chatbot feature in its mobile client. Users can chat with the bot and get the information they want, such as their insurance plan coverage, policies, or even a quote.
Amazon - Tag
Amazon designs many types of tags to differentiate the tons of items on its website. These tags have different priorities, and they influence customers' shopping behaviour.
Grammarly - Checker
Grammarly is a cloud-based typing assistant that reviews spelling, grammar, punctuation, clarity, engagement, and delivery mistakes. It uses artificial intelligence to identify and search for an appropriate replacement for the error it locates. It also allows users to customize their style, tone, and context-specific language.
MUJI - Banner
MUJI US designs a banner on their consumer website. This banner design is very flexible. The information shown on the banner is rolling and changes over time. Sometimes it shows announcements, sometimes it shows alerts, and sometimes it shows policy updates.
Goals
Based oh the research findings that I have, I make these 3 goals for my design.
basic Ideas
Let people have a brief cognition that what they are encouraged to buy, what they are eligible to buy, and what they want to buy.
know the detail
When user find their interested item, provide the bite size information to guide them how they can get that item.
Error slips and mistakes
Auto remind people if they trigger some policies.
ideation
To achieve my goals, I generated these 7 ideas for every stage of the procurement journey. I separated my idea into 5 parts, discovering, detail page, add to cart, cart, and everywhere. I will explain my ideas in this sequence as well.
Color
Color has visual salience and symbolism. Plus, visuals communicate information 60,000 times faster than text. Therefore, using color to inform users of the difference between items will be an intuitive and effective way to guide the users in the procurement journey.
Tags
It will be a great way to attach some tags on the product cards, to provide users with some brief and bite-size information.
Mapping
Flight pass inspired me with this idea. A flight pass is not only a pass that can help us to check in at the airport but also a brief instruction that can offer you necessary information. Thus, I think it will be helpful if we can provide our users with concise instructions on how they can get the item.
Guide
When the user requests some items with a complicated process, this idea can be an excellent solution to help the company collect some required information. It can also help the user to simplify the request flow.
checker
Grammar serves as the rule or structural constraint for human language. Similarly, the procurement policy can also be seen as the procurement principles. We have a grammar checker to check our grammar mistakes and provide suggestions; why can't we have a policy checker if we have triggered some policies?
ChatBot
Adding a floating chatbot will bring users convenience for user to ask questions when they meet some unpredictable problems. There are hundreds of potential for a bot, it will not just serve like a search engine. It can be smarter. We can let it learn from user and try to provide the information that user need. Moreover, we can let it predict and guess what users' needs.
Notification
In current portal, users cannot know if they have triggered some policies or if some changes have happened to the approval flow. Thus, they always need to use the platform meticulously to ensure they don't make any mistakes. If there is a notification feature that can automatically notify the users of what happened, it will be very helpful.
Idea selection
After I taken the effort/impact into consideration, I picked "Color", "Tags", "Mapping", and "Checker" to dive deep. These four ideas can cover the whole journey of product discovery.
effort impact matrix
Dive Deep & Deliveries
I found 3 use cases that users will encounter when they walk through the procurement journey. I list them below and I will explain how my design can help users succeed when they meet those use cases.
Product segments
In the product discovery stage, currently, the company has many different product segments. Some are company preferred, and some are not. However, there is no symbol to tell the user this information while browsing the items. How can we use design to guide people to choose the products the company prefers them to buy?
How to get the item
When the user finds interest in some items, especially those with complicated approval flow, such as high-value products or something that may refer to security issues, these items probably have some restricted and complex policies. Currently, we have no way to find the information to tell us how to request them.
slips and mistakes
People may trigger some policies they don’t know about, and they are also afraid to make that happen. However, there is no such feature in the current system to help them to avoid or remind them of these mistakes.
Solution #1 - color & tag
I did some research for "color symbolism" and "visual salience" to make sure I used the color on the right way. I align my design with SAP design system as well.
I distinguish different product segments by designing various colored labels. I also create many tags and an approval flow indicator to reinforce the cognition of the labels and provide more information.
I distinguish different product segments by designing various colored labels. I also create many tags and an approval flow indicator to reinforce the cognition of the labels and provide more information.
Components
Home Page
search result
Solution #2 - Concise Instruction
When the users come to the detail page, they probably have some interest in the product and want to know how to get it. Therefore, I put a "How can I get this item?" button to seduce users to click it and offer them a procurement instruction. This procurement instruction will provide users with the necessary information to let them know how to get the item and foresee the approval flow and time. If the user has some other questions that they cannot find the answer on the instruction, they can send a message. Then, an assistant will contact them and answer their question.
detail page
procurement instruction
sent successfully
Solution #3 - Policy checker
Although there are many ways to ensure people avoid triggering those unwanted policies before the checkout phase, people can still make mistakes. It may be by accident or because the people added many items and triggered some unknown policies. Therefore, it's necessary to have a policy checker on the cart page to help people to walk through their shopping cart before they checkout.
This policy checker can automatically check if there are some potential problems with the items and give suggestions. Users can walk through the issues listed and see whether they want to correct or dismiss them
This policy checker can automatically check if there are some potential problems with the items and give suggestions. Users can walk through the issues listed and see whether they want to correct or dismiss them
cart page - order summary view
cart page - policy issue summary view
Usability testing & iteration
I did usability testing and iterated my design based on the feedback that I got. The deliveries that show above are the final version.
Wrap Up
In this project, I produced an end-to-end policy-driven procurement experience and gained a lot from this internship experience. I found many differences between doing school projects and real-world projects since many practical problems and constraints need to be considered.
It's enjoyable to work with UX researchers and other designers. They gave me a lot of helpful feedback for my work and offered me valuable advice for my future career as well.
If I have more time, I will talk with the user assistance team about the name of the product type and see if they have some good insights for me to make the design more user-friendly. Also, I want to collaborate deeply with the designer responsible for the admin side. Then, bring the policy checker design to the next level.
It's enjoyable to work with UX researchers and other designers. They gave me a lot of helpful feedback for my work and offered me valuable advice for my future career as well.
If I have more time, I will talk with the user assistance team about the name of the product type and see if they have some good insights for me to make the design more user-friendly. Also, I want to collaborate deeply with the designer responsible for the admin side. Then, bring the policy checker design to the next level.
