This case study addresses a complex problem with potential for significant business impact. I made design decisions with scalability and KPIs in mind, while iterating on direct user feedback.

Discover

Competitive analysis

User surveys

User interviews

Ideate

Problem definition

Solution exploration

Feature scoping

Design

Storyboard

User flows

Wireframing

Prototyping

Edge cases

Test

User interviews

7-day access tests

Beta tests

Measure

Track impact

Discovery

Competitive analysis

Based on our exploration of the existing business landscape, brands...

...wanted an easy way to share and manage campaigns without having to use too many tools

...needed a more efficient way to organize and track creators within their campaigns

...had trouble finding creators that suit their niche when looking to promote their products through influencer marketing

User research

Brand interviews and surveys

Goal

Further define and validate challenges brands experience with influencer campaigns

Define existing solutions being used to tackle those problems, and their pros/cons
Determine features needed to tackle these problems

Existing solutions found

Searching for creators

77.3% search natively in social media apps for creators

Sharing campaigns

61.7% share a campaign brief or customized template with creators

Organizing campaigns

61% use spreadsheets to organize their influencer marketing

Pros: Simple, flexible, can use integrations and formulas
Cons: Clunky, manual updates, no result tracking, not centralized

Problem

Communicating with creators

Negotiating, pitching, setting expectations while staying organized

Finding authentic and reliable creators

Brands want to work with authentic and reliable creators who align with their brand and values

Communicating with creators

Negotiating, pitching, setting expectations while staying organized

Solutions needed

Find creators

Allow brands to search our creator database to find creators to collaborate with and invite to campaigns

Create + share campaigns

Allow brands to post campaigns that creators can apply to

Manage campaigns

Allow brands to manage their campaigns and creators seamlessly

Storyboard

I led a half-day collaborative sketching session between PM and design for brainstorming, journey mapping, and storyboarding, in order to guide the next steps for design.

Feature scoping

Determine features to be built + collaborative shaping sessions to scope complex features

Estimate level of effort vs. impact to determine feature prioritization

Divide features into phases within our roadmap in order to plan detailed yet flexible sprint timelines

KPIs

Active campaigns

Number of campaigns posted by brands

Matches made

Number of creators added to campaigns

Flow maps

Select steps to view

1. Create campaign

2. Find + save creators

3. Manage campaigns + review applicants

1. Create campaign

2. Find + save creators

3. Manage campaigns + review applicants

Wireframes

Select steps to view

1. Set up brand profile

2. Create campaign

3. Find + add creators to campaign

4. Manage campaigns + review applicants

1. Set up brand profile

2. Create campaign

3. Find + add creators to campaign

4. Manage campaigns + review applicants

User testing

Goals

Find creators

Confirm creator profiles contain enough useful information
Confirm if the filters are appropriate for what users would typically search
Confirm if search results are sufficient in quality and quantity

Manage campaigns

Better understand and validate the problem of organizing creators
Validate our Manage Campaign solution

Methodology

7 user interviews with participants experienced in influencer marketing

8-day feature access to allow participants to test the product

Review of participants’ sessions and follow-up survey

Findings

Find creators

Lack of search results, requiring them to significantly broaden their search criteria (typically expected 50-100 results)

Search filters were sufficient for most users, with minor improvement suggestions for the Industry, Engagement, and Location filters

All users were able to easily save creators and said they would save a short list then contact in bulk within 1-4 weeks

Manage campaigns

All users saw value in a separate organizational level beyond Saved Creators

Brands liked that there was a flexible way to add notes for each creator

Default campaign stages matched the expected workflow for a product campaign, but not all campaign types (e.g. evergreen)

Brands liked having a centralized system for a social team to work

Additional feature requests for discovery: In-app communication, campaign duplication, campaign post analytics, task reminders, campaign brief mood boards

Iterations

Changelog

Manage campaigns

Automate movement of creators through campaign stages to reduce manual effort

Find creators (search filters)

Change Industry to multi-select, broaden Location, provide help text in tooltips to explain Engagement calculations

Next steps

Explore more automated and flexible ways to organize creators in a campaign
Allow brands to add inspiration content to campaign briefs
Explore and scope an in-app communication solution
Continue recruiting creators to improve search results

Feature request exploration

I introduced a collaborative Feature Shaping Session to our discovery process for an in-app communication feature.

This framework involving PM, design, and lead engineers, improved the efficiency of our discovery process for future projects, and allowed us to determine the feature as out of scope upfront.

Individual sketching

Product manager

Product designer

Lead engineers

Discussion

Technical constraints

Components and access

Rabbitholes

Items for discovery

Mockups

Select steps to view

1. Set up brand profile

2. Create campaign

3. Find + add creators to campaign

4. Manage campaigns + review applicants

1. Set up brand profile

2. Create campaign

3. Find + add creators to campaign

4. Manage campaigns + review applicants

Impact

Conversion metrics

The conversion rates indicated that many users were able to successfully add creators to campaigns, but the raw numbers indicated that discovery/adoption for these features was low.

Created campaign

Added creator to a campaign

46.7%

Beta (Jun 20/22 - Jul 30/22)

41.4%

Full release (Aug 1/22 - Apr 1/23)

Reasons for low adoption

No marketing: No marketing for an entirely new suite of collaborative features, resulting in low discovery on both the brand and creator side.
Campaign application paywall: In order to apply to campaigns during the first year of release, creators had to be signed up for a paid plan with Later, resulting in low application rates.

What I learned

Break complex projects into phases

Makes it easier to plan timelines, iterate, and test features early

Collaborate early with PMs to define KPIs

Supports building a business case for design decisions and balancing user needs with strategic goals

Get feedback from engineers early and frequently

Identifies constraints and edge cases upfront, allowing more time to focus on innovation

Get feedback from other designers throughout the process

Prevents tunnel vision and ensures team visibility for a consistent product experience

Other contributions at Later

Medium | Q&A with the UX Designers at Later

Notion | Shaping Session Template

Case study | Creator & Brand Collabs - For Creators

Case study | Media Kit

Later | Creator & Brand Collabs - For Creators

work

about

illustration

music

resume

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resume

How might we help brands manage their campaigns and find creators to collaborate with?

Background

This project aimed to expand our services by building a creator marketplace where brands could...

share campaigns for creators to apply to

find creators to collaborate with

manage their campaigns

Design process

Discovery

Competitive analysis

User research

Brand interviews and surveys

Existing solutions found

Problem

Communicating with creators

Finding authentic and reliable creators

Communicating with creators

Solutions needed

Find creators

Create + share campaigns

Manage campaigns

Storyboard

Feature scoping

KPIs

Active campaigns

Number of campaigns posted by brands

Matches made

Number of creators added to campaigns

Flow maps

Wireframes

User testing

Goals

Methodology

Findings

Iterations

Changelog

Next steps

Feature request exploration

I introduced a collaborative Feature Shaping Session to our discovery process for an in-app communication feature.

Mockups

Impact

Conversion metrics

Created campaign

Added creator to a campaign

46.7%

41.4%

Reasons for low adoption

What I learned

Break complex projects into phases

Collaborate early with PMs to define KPIs

Get feedback from engineers early and frequently

Get feedback from other designers throughout the process

Other contributions at Later