Cloud Services
— For Supply Chain Management
CLIENT
Microsoft Azure Infra, AI, & Data,
Compete and Partner Team
YEAR
Strategy
User Experience
Creative Direction
Web Design
Creating a digital tool for Global Black Belt Sales team to target the Supply Chain Management industry
A five year Intel Strategic Fund for $36 Million was given to the Compete and Partner research team. In this project we conducted an Executive Opinion Survey engaging fintech business leaders from around the world on their perceptions of the top cloud uses.
This year the Compete and Partner team wanted to rethink their typical sales talk track and transition their findings to a digital tool that will enable users such as Global Black Belts to acquire, play, and analyze the data digitally to sell more effectively.
Originally available as a printed report and digital long-form article, it was becoming harder to measure the spread and efficiency of the information and its medium. A key goal for this project was to effectively measure impact while making the research more accessible and digestible to the sales team.
As the creative lead on the project, I worked closely with the research team and our dev team to create an overall strategy, build the user experience, design a visual system and oversee implementation. The goal was to improve the talk track of the sales team for Azure Cloud services by targeting companies who use supply chain management services.
GETTING STARTED
The project kicked off in early August 2021 and we were given a 8-month timeline that included discovery, strategy, execution, and handoffs.
During our discovery phase, we worked with the Compete and Partner research team to explore the Microsoft Azure’s history and understand their own research on performance and engagement. We conducted stakeholder interviews across the organization selecting leaders on internal teams that contribute to their research, use it to build their own projects, and external partners supporting their work. Lastly, we relied on existing research to inform us about the users and their existing user journey, then conducted deep-dives and partner goal sessions to understand where we want to evolve the journey and strengthen it in a digital version.
Foundation
- What are key user behaviors, mindsets, pain points and opportunities?
- How do those user behaviors map to the brand and product goals?
Definition
- What does the experience need to deliver across a journey within the various ecosystem touch points?
- What are our immediate priorities to pursue vs. long-term priorities?
Execution
- How does the journey come to life for the user?
After gaining an understanding of the existing product, primary task flows, the target audience, and technical constraints, we structured our strategy and design process.
OUR USERS
The work of Microsoft’s Compete and Partner research team targeted and attracted sales strategy and Global Black Belts, private-sector partner fintech business leaders, and public-sector officials from around the world. In addition, we knew that there were many more user groups, like Engineering and product management who visit our report sites as well. For our target users and additional users, there is a range of connectivity and tech-savviness to account for. From our research, we also knew…
They care deeply about the data
All of our users build on our research and insights and use it to inform their own projects, media content, and business practices. They either drop in to the research to quickly get specific data points and/or read the full report to further identify patterns specific to their own work
Needs to immerse themselves
Our research has various user journeys centered on the users location, profession, and their intended output. All users value being able to go deep in the data and visualizations to mine the aspects that are specific to them.
Empowered to look closer
Media and private sector professionals often question the data and engage the organization for opportunities for discourse around the research.
PRIMARY GOAL
We prioritized giving the data center stage and created a one-page web experience that was unobtrusive and reduced distractions to lend deep focus on the work at hand. We structured the product for increased utility and improved ease of use, which would heighten retention in the Microsoft Azure ecosystem.
USER EXPERIENCE
After our discover and strategy sessions we established a proper information architecture and user flows for the one-page site.
Challenged by the fact that we couldn’t get direct access to our end-users, we condensed down our IA into low-fidelity wireframes that we tested with internal teams that work directly with our end-users to get a theory around the usability.
We iterated towards hi-fidelity wireframes and then prototypes to further address some of the design objectives and tested with our partners, stakeholders, and again with internal teams that work with our end-user to evolve the user flow and tweak the wireframes.
