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My client is a leading car dealership that exclusively sells Tata vehicles. They had slowly taken over the pickup-truck market and as well as the market for other vehicles used by small and large business. They were aiming at expanding their business and decided that they needed a website. They wanted to create a website that would cater to large corporate businesses as well as small businesses.
The clients were having difficulty bridging different user segments. They could see that their clientele was almost equally divided between their corporate clients and small businesses. The problem arose when we realized that the organization had relied on different marketing strategies for the two major segmentations and we were unable to move ahead would finding an overlap.
As the lead UI Designer, I had a few roles to fulfill
It was important for us to create a few bridges between user segmentation. That was clear for us from the start. So our first step was to get in touch with the users (the buyers) right away.
The first step was to get the client to agree to share its buyer details. It was extremely difficult for them to share such sensitive information. The client only agreed to let us interview their buyers after promising that all user interviews would be conducted in the presence of one of their representatives. We interviewed 10 users from each segment, created empathy maps, and looked for overlaps in their needs and aspirations before moving ahead. We also tried to find overlaps in their digital media consumption so that we could place their aesthetic taste on a few spectrums.
The next step in the process was to define User Personas. Distilling the information that we gathered from the user interviews was very important to aid in our design decisions later on.
Some user personas that we created during this stage
After finding common areas between the different user segments, it was important for us to create a visual library of their respective tastes and preferences and find a way to create an amalgamation that pleased both the user segments. A significant amount of time was dedicated to creating a moodboard that would represent our understanding of the aesthetic preferences of both segments.
A part of the moodboard that was created during this stage
Despite there being a massive lack of clarity in the early stages of the design process, we were in a much better state when we moved on to designing the actual website. In the end, we were able to create some UI patterns that we were proud of.
After we had a clear idea about the information each segment was looking for, we were able to segment the content of our landing page in accordance. Some segments would simply push specific high-selling vehicles while some segments encouraged to research and comparison between different models.
Some website sections were designed keeping specific user groups in mind
This was another output of our interaction with the staff of our clients. We learned that used vehicle sellers had to visit their offices or resort to social media to simply register themselves. A simple form ended up doubling their leads for vehicle sellers and it drastically improved their productivity as well.
A simple form that a seller would have to fill out to register their vehicles
There was a deep lack of clarity early on in the process. However, as we continued to interview users, we gained more insight into their thinking and that slowly helped us plan for the design decisions. One thing is very clear now. It’s very important to trust the process even if everything seems confusing and convoluted at the start.
© 2023 Apurba Neupane
