Yahoo by Verizon
Yahoo! Business is a subcompany within Verizon Business Group which empowers business owners to launch and scale their ideas online. From creating a website to promoting a brand, our products help entrepreneurs succeed. The biggest project at Yahoo! Business was the introduction of Business Maker, which allows new entrepreneurs an all-in-one solution for all their business needs.
TASK
User Research
Responsive Wireframes
Mid-fidelity Designs
High-fidelity Designs
THE CHALLENGE
Design an all-in-one dashboard experience for new small businesses
Our goal for the project was to gather the insights discovered by our research team and create a dashboard that encompasses all the tools our B2B customers would need. Our ambitions were to integrate all legacy and new products in one platform that embraced not only new business owners, but also helped our users evolve and grow their businesses.
My role
I led the design of the onboarding and dashboard experience from March 2019 to September 2019 and collaborated with two other designers on the bundles and checkout experience.
KICKOFF
Gathering all the insights conducted by our research team and closing the gaps
I worked closely with the research team at Verizon. I studied all the existing data and insights on our potential user base for Business Maker.
Our early insights
Yahoo legacy customers do not represent Business Maker users
The majority of existing customers who are using Yahoo SMB web hosting, domains, and website builders do not represent our new products target audience.
Verizon existing business customers are interested in an all-in-one solution
Verizon researcher conducted a product validation research which found that majority of existing users would have purchased an all-in-one solution if it were a reliable product and if it had existing when they started their business.
People who are hobbist may not identify themselves as a small business
Majority of our existing customers believe they are using their website for their hobby and while they are also considered a small business, may not have identified themselves as one.
DISCOVERY
Getting to know our Business Maker customers and their needs
I was surprised by the level of interest new business owners had on a product that would allow them to get everything they need for their small business in one place. I looked to the brands our users trusted to understand the reason for their success.
Competitive Analysis of end-to-end experience of trusted brands
Identifying what our personas needs are as small business owners
Validation research on established businesses proved the need for a product like Business Maker.
APPROACH
Starting with our long-term goal and scaling back
I facilitated a user story mapping session to help our PMs and design team visualize where and how Business Maker would house all our products.
Session participants
Head of Design
3 Designers + Facilitator
3 Product Managers
Head of Product
Information Architecture
DESIGN
Create end-to-end designs for Business Maker
Color palette
Ideograms
Illustrations
Final Product Designs
2 level, collapsible navigation with a sliding interaction on the 2nd level
Friendly welcome message for every first time user seeing the dashboard for the first time
Welcome tooltips and animations experience for mobile web
To-do cards prioritized by importance and arranged to guide users to complete them in order
Samples of the accounting product page for business maker
IMPACT
A good start, there are more days to come
In the early days of production, the results have exceeded our expectations. Since the launch of the Business Maker, the median number of active customers has increased by 40% Despite this rapid growth, we improved on key engagement, retention, adoption and acquisition metrics.
100
New paid subscriptions within the first month of launch
21%
Increased median transferring customer from legacy product
19%
Reduced drop-off rate at sign-up after BM launch
REFLECTIONS
What I learned
"Continuously revisiting our process enabled us to understand our mistakes and keep a constant momentum in refining and improving..."
It took a lot of educating and patience to emphasize to my team the importance of having a process. It was often challenging to convince business and PMs to set time aside to have retrospect meetings, but it was worth the fight. Continuously revisiting our process enabled us to understand our mistakes and keep a constant momentum in refining and improving our process for every sprint.
"...doing my own additional research allowed me to have a better understanding of our users and connect with them on a more holistic level."
I found that we had wealth of resources where user research had already been conducted for us and validated the concept of Business Maker. NonetheIess, I convinced my stakeholders the importance of allowing me time to conduct my own quick research and discovery because by doing my own additional research allowed me to have a better understanding of our users and connect with them on a more holistic level.There was big challenge trying to meet both business goals, while also meeting user goals. While business wanted a product urgently to satisfy promises made to our executives at Verizon, but as a designer.
"...I also realized that our users can be unforgiving."
After our product was launched, I also realized that our users can be unforgiving. If their first impression with our product didn't establish the trust needed for them to buy into the idea, then changing their minds would take even more effort.
