Transforming recommendations for Vista's customer needs
Strategic design
System thinking
UX/UI Design
Prototyping
Overview
Vista is a design and marketing platform for small businesses. Alongside Vistaprint's custom printing services, it offers design tools for social media graphics through Vista Create, connects users with designers via 99designs, and partners with Wix for website creation, providing comprehensive branding and marketing support for businesses at every stage.
I was the Lead UX Designer for the Recommendations team, working closely as a product trio with the PM, the Engineer Manager and the Tech Lead, 6 Engineers, a Data Analyst, and a Data Scientist.
THE PROBLEM
Vistaprint's Recommendations component generated over $90 million in bookings last year but mainly promoted printed products, leaving many customers unaware of Vistaprint's full range of services.
This lack of diverse suggestions across the customer journey makes it harder for Vistaprint to be seen as a the design and marketing partner for small businesses they can be.
THE OUTCOMES
WHAT I DID
THE PROCESS
Research and Analysis
Navigating internal stakeholders, technical constraints and opportunities and different data sources was an extensive task that let me connect with many product teams and designers.
The Vista service ecosystem is complex, and Vistaprint alone has more than 70 product teams distributed worldwide.
Scattered offer
Design services and products are spread across various internal companies under Vista's umbrella, such as 99D, Vista Create, and Logomaker.
Team ownership
The Recommendations team owns the component and its API, designed to seamlessly integrate at any point in the user journey.
Stakeholder complexity
Each site placement involved negotiations with various teams to address their differing needs, constraints and roadmap.
Data resources potential
The diverse product and customer data sources present a challenge but offer immense potential for hyper-personalization.
Customer Journey analysis
Analyzing customer journeys for new and returning users revealed a key issue: the purchase-focused design limits flexibility, making it harder for users to find inspiration or learn. This evidenced a clear need to support more diverse user goals.
Customers want to get inspiration and achieve bigger design and marketing goals with Vista, beyond just creating printed materials.
The business opportunity for Vista was significant, with its unique position to offer personalized, relevant guidance and support exactly when they needed it.
Design and Development
Prioritizing customer problems and pairing with company’s strategy
I used the existing customer profiling and market research, leveraged qualitative and quantitative data insights and made customer surveys to come up with an ordered list of top customer problems.
Design sprint
I organized and facilitated a four-day design sprint at the company's office in Barcelona, which involved designers, product managers, engineers, and data scientists.
This collaborative effort included ideation, prototyping, and user testing using high-fidelity prototypes to validate new concepts.
Prototyping and user-testing
During the design sprint we built a narrative to work upon with so we could test our hypothesis. It was the story of Sammy, owner of a small beverage company preparing to attend an event.
I designed a high-fidelity prototype to test with real customers and was involved into customer interviews.
Main design sprint findings
People appreciate helpful suggestions that make decisions easier, give ideas, and boost confidence.
Recommendations that fit their needs and goals feel more useful.
Users are willing to share details like their budget or business type if they get more personalized recommendations.
Having all products in one place simplifies shopping and ensures compatibility.
Simplicity is great, but users also want options to customize products to fit their needs.
The strategic recommendations framework
With all that information in mind, I developed a strategic framework for a holistic recommendation system that goes beyond simply suggesting products, aiming to provide hyper-personalized support.
The idea is to integrate diverse data sources, utilize customer insights, and align recommendations with business objectives depending on customer's context.
The goal is to ensure that users receive exactly what they need at the right moment.
Consistent UX/UI pattern
I fixed UI inconsistencies in how recommendations were shown by creating a unified design for product tile that worked in site placement, and defined a consistent UX pattern, adding helpful features like more images, detailed info, a quantity picker, and options to add to cart, edit, or view a product.
I used Vista’s SWAN design system and contributed to improving the overall visual style across the platform.
A holistic recommendation system delivering personalized, contextual suggestions across the customer journey.
It boosts customer engagement, simplifies decisions, and creates new revenue opportunities, and supports Vistaprint’s vision to be the leading design and marketing partner for small businesses by offering not just tailored product and service recommendations, but also guidance and inspiration.