VideoShops Case Study
Building a UX culture and facilitating a strategic pivot
Background
A struggling startup in a tough industry
VideoShops is a series-A funded company specializing in video commerce. The platform lets consumers buy products directly off videos and lets content creators sell products on video. The company was having major issues with usability. It turned out this was the just tip of the iceberg. The product was stalled in development due a bottleneck in design.
Step 1
Assessed the situation
At first glance, a number of challenges surfaced immediately. A platform that combines e-commerce and video will include not only the difficulties for each of them, but a number of unforeseen difficulties involved in combining the two. Video commerce was and remains a highly contested space, but none of the competitors have created a successful formula in the industry.
Step 2
Identified tactical challenge
There was no design organization to speak of at the company. There was initially no VP of Product, and there was never a Chief Design Officer, resulting in little strategic importance given to UX. This was reflected in the lack of executive understanding of the product reality, and the revolving door of UX freelancers creating a lack of continuity and giving UX no voice at the company.
Step 3
Created a cohesive picture of the product
There was no strategic visibility into the workings of the product. Even at ground-level, designers did not know what the others were up to. This resulted in a cacophony of redundant and obsolete design files and a bottleneck in the pipeline. I worked to create a single view of what the product was meant to be, getting the buy-in of all key C and VP level decision-makers.
Step 4
Organized the Figmaspace
In addition to cleaning up the damage done by a lack of organization, I created processes and standards that kept everything functioning smoothly. As a result, everyone, including designers, developers, PMs, and non-product staff, could understand the state of the product at any moment.
Step 5
Created an ad-hoc UX organization
A primary cause of issues within the product group was the lack of communication. There was very little communication, in particular between visual/marketing and UX. In fact, there was not even a UX slack channel. I set up a series of recurring meetings to keep everyone on the same page. The one thing I didn't do? Daily standups. Not ever.
Step 6
Cleared headspace to rethink the product
Once the issue of a common truth in the product organization was resolved, the next challenge was the issue of product-market fit, which had never really been touched. The company lacked UX researchers, but I was able to train the partner outreach staff to collect UX research data. This let us identify gaps in the market and how we could fill them.
Step 7
Created a plan for a strategic pivot
A better understanding of the product and its relation to the market gave us a clear picture of what we needed to do. VideoShops faced the classic "cold start problem" in which a company needs users to offer a valuable product, but needs a valuable product to attract those users. I developed a business pivot plan that turned the problem on its head.
Step 8
Led the design for the pivot
The new business model entailed a major reworking of the product. It moved the focus of the app from the content creator to the retail consumer while obviating the need for mobile creation tools. To demonstrate the feasibility of the business plan, we had to show the feasibility of the technology plan. I got buy-in from all necessary stakeholders to design and build a working prototype of the new software.