APRICOT is shifting the traditional business mindset from benefiting businesses first to benefiting individuals/consumers first. An innovative platform designed to financially activate women through a revolutionary referral based social-selling marketplace. A shopping destination that has conscious brands where all consumers earn for recommending their favorite products to their favorite people.
I played a major role in creating and launching the APRICOT platform. Based on user testing and analyzed data, the platform evolved from a disjointed experience to a cohesive and seamless platform that can be navigated without friction.
Lead Product Designer
Product Design, UX/UI design, UX Research, Prototyping
Apricot is revolutionizing the commerce ecosystem by investing in and connecting all individuals with their power and influence. Individual is: the consumer, the founder, the brand champion, the mother, the father, the friend, the mentor. Investing in products, people, brands, connecting, education, community.
COMPANY GOALS:
When I first joined APRICOT there were a lot of pain-points for our beta users. As we onboarded a set of users and watched others on hotjar we saw a lot of drop offs and barriers. Some of the biggest issues for users:
How can we remove the barriers keeping users from shopping on APRICOT and sharing their Collection with friends?
When Beta launched, we noticed users would create collections, add products and never return. They weren't shopping. We decided to shift our company goals to prioritize shopping over creating Collections, writing reviews, and sharing (which were the big selling points of APRICOT). The top goal now was generating sales so APRICOT could be successful.
In order to reduce drop-offs we changed our onboarding experience. We already knew that users did not want to create Collections before exploring the App nor add products or reviews right away.
I removed the top barriers for users:
1. Mandatory Collection creation
2. Mandatory reviews
3. Mandatory to add 3 products before publishing your Collection
In an effort to make the UX more seamless when navigating between the Collection and the Portal, I made updates that kept the platform all in one place with a seamless transition between managing their Collection and shopping APRICOT.
Phase 1 went through user testing and the results were
1. Pivoting is necessary when assumptions are not met.
We must understand our users, their problems and solve for it WITH design. The platform started as a Portal with a poor shopping experience but evolved into a end-to-end ecommerce solution with a strong shopping UX.
2. Prioritize.
Make a plan to launch the MVP. During this process a lot of hiccups and barriers occur that could potentially derail the project. Be realistic on what is capable for the product to launch timely and efficiently when working with an agile workflow.
3. Defend product decisions that put your user's needs first.
The most important designs need to benefit the user even if more features are wanted or stakeholders don't see why. Our job as designers are to put our users' first and explain to stakeholders why we are prioritizing projects using the RICE scoring model.
Don't be shy! Say hello and we'll get in touch.
irinisarlis@gmail.com
