Adzooma
Overview
Producing a new UI for a Saas platform website with researched UX principles in mind.
Responsibilities
Research, wireframing, prototyping and interface design.
Year
2019 - 2021
Location
Nottingham
About
Adzooma is an online marketing platform that combines Google, Facebook and Microsoft Ads in one platform making it easier for marketers to automate and manage all their online campaigns.
The Task
After going through a business restructure, the company decided to rebrand which also meant a new website.
The Team
I was the Lead UX and UI Designer working with a team of one Digital Designer, two Front-end Developers and two copywriters.
Process
The present website had been live since 2019 and over the past couple of years a lot of data had
been collected which helped to kick start the project with a clear direction.
Research
Collaborate
Prototype & Design
Research & Planning
With a different target audience, this meant organising sessions to make the wider teams aware of the goal.
Collaborative feedback
The first session was making all the parties aware of the new goal, from the Development team to the Sales team.
I hosted sessions with the wider team that had a direct link to the current target audience for feedback on the current website or any information that could help the new goal. (Customer Support Team, Sales Team)
Benchmarking
The new business structure also meant looking at a wider benchmark with a larger variety of opportunities.
Some note worthy industry leaders allowed me to showcase to the stakeholders which direction we were willing to go and how we were going to present it.
This helped build trust and confidence with the wider team, making everyone supportive and keen towards the end result.
Design & Prototype
Once the new brand guidelines and wireframes were complete, few began working on design systems for the website.
Design Systems
Along with new brand guidelines, the digital design systems went through a redesign which also meant a new CSS library.
This was a collaborative effort between the design and development teams. All the assets were created with a new CMS in mind. This build was being designed with less development time in mind. The site needed to be interchangeable with a quick turnaround with live edits. This would especially be crucial for A/B testing purposes.
The new design systems were not set in stone as part of the goal was to user test the website as much as possible.
Illustrations
The new brand also came with a different approach to a wider audience. This meant a more literal approach which was less technical was needed to make the software appear more digestible to every level of user.
The feedback also suggested that we needed a friendlier less co-operate look. The best solution for this was more illustrations and less stock imagery.
The software could also appear intimidating to entry-level users so we going to only showcase a few assets and not the whole platform.
I settled on 3D rendered illustrations that I create in Adobe Muse. The illustrations had a consistent use of colour to keep them in line with the new brand guidelines.
Mobile
Prototype
It was a no brainer that most of our marketing channels will be targeting on social media which also meant our mobile traffic would be high.
We decided to make the mobile site priority which meant design systems and copy structure were considered for mobile first.
The result made the relativity to tablet and desktop much easier, especially for the development team.
Desktop
Prototype
The final design strategically emulated what the stakeholders had briefed. Collaborating with the wider team proved to be very resourceful and effective.
The brand guidelines, tone of voice and design systems complimented each other well because everyone had the same goals in mind and understood the assignment.
Conclusion
This was probably the most collaborative project I worked on. Which I found very effective during the whole process.
Reflect
This project was very well executed with all deadlines meant on time. Essentially this came down to constant collaboration sessions with the wider team and making sure everyone was on the same level of understanding.
Any concerns that came up were dealt with at a reasonable time which was very good.
Challenges
I would say the biggest challenge was the 3D illustrations. I was the only designer capable of producing these and this was a concern for the wider team at first.
However, I took it upon myself to introduce the software to the rest of the design team and started teaching them how to utilise it. Soon enough the rest of the team were able to produce their illustrations without my assistance.
Future Planning
The key aspect from a UX point of view was researching and user testing the new site.
User testing had always been a second thought but with the launch of this site, I put in plans in once for user testing, A/B testing and heat-maps and customer feedback request on the website’s performance.