Six Lessons Learned Designing a Product Site in Six Weeks
In late 2019, I joined a team of designers as a content strategist to create a website for an international bank’s blockchain platform. Though I had worked on similar projects, this project was intimidating because it involved a lot of marketing and branding work that I was less familiar with than my usual UX responsibilities. I was happy to learn that I’d be working alongside two experienced designers throughout the project, but also felt a little uneasy because 80% of the job would be remote- which was a big change from working out of a studio.
The project was fast-paced and intense. Every day there was a new challenge, whether it involved wrapping my head around the intricacies of the client’s service, or communicating user needs with limited research. Ultimately specifications were delivered on time, and in good shape. This article sums up six big lessons I learned along the way!
1. Strong communication makes remote work easier
Check-in meetings with our client and daily stand-ups with our team helped us answer questions, plan, and get crucial feedback. Goals were communicated for each meeting which helped us get the outputs we needed to move forward. Great communication and time management were critical to our success as a remote team.
2. Start simple to make big content decisions early
We represented content as conceptual ‘blocks’ early on to help our team focus on the information architecture of the site without visual support. This allowed us to easily shift content around, similarly to a card sort. We only presented content and visual design together at the end of the project, which led to more useful feedback.
3. Build alignment with design tools and workshops
Ambiguity between user and business goals made it difficult to figure out what content should be prioritized and why. Design tools like personas and message architectures helped us communicate user and business needs, make content decisions, and build alignment between different stakeholders.
4. Take notes on the fly to keep feedback organized
I took a lot of notes and coded them on the fly to prevent information from becoming ambiguous or lost. Coding for pointed feedback, user goals, and business goals helped me make the most out of limited time with stakeholders. Annotating wireframes directly through InVision helped provide context to feedback collected during design reviews.
5. Some research is better than no research
The timeline for the project made it hard to do primary research. We had to be resourceful with the information that was available. Analyzing public data through content audits, secondary research, stakeholder interviews, competitive analyses, and guerilla user research allowed me to do a lot with limited resources.
6. Take regular breaks!
Fast-paced projects can be stressful and it’s easy to get tunnel-vision or burn out when working remotely. Taking breaks and keeping a steady rhythm helped to approach difficult problems with a fresh perspective. ✌️
