Overview

C Spire is a telecommunications company and is the nation's largest privately held wireless carrier with stores all over the Southeastern region of the United States. Due to the pandemic, C Spire had an increasing need to transition their business to be digital only, specifically allowing their customers to buy products and self-service online, thus reducing the need for in-store customer service and sales reps.

The Challenge

How might we eliminate the need for sales reps by delivering a seamless B2B shopping experience for existing customers?

Personas

C Spire Business serves a range of customers - from Mom-and-Pop shops to Enterprise Organizations. Because of this, C Spire conducted a research study of around 20 customers helped us understand that there are 3 main personas:

1. Old School
   This individual may be the owner of their business and has no idea what they are doing. They would rather trust a sales rep to make recommendations for them instead of learning or even purchasing products online.

2. Digital Native
   These are individuals who perhaps grew up in the digital age. They are tech-savvy and are used to purchasing online. They may not know a lot about Business products, but they would rather figure it out for themselves and only resort to sales reps if necessary.

3. IT Expert
   Like the name suggests, their job is to understand the ins-and-outs to setting up internet and voice products for their business. They are most likely part of a larger organization, and they know exactly what they are looking for.

Pain Points

C Spire also conducted usability testing on the current state of eCommerce within the C Spire Business Portal. Below are 4 key pain points that they discovered:

Design Process

1. Discovery
   This step is my initial understanding of the requirements (user wants to do XYZ, or C Spire needs to sell XYZ). During this time, I would walk through any preliminary questions, constraints, and need for user testing with the Product Manager and any C Spire key stakeholders.

2. Research
   There are three main categories I go through to conduct my research.

   • Current State Assessment: I worked alongside Charles, our eCommerce and Analytics Lead, to dig through the data and see where the drop-offs are and what UI issues we think are causing those drop-offs.

   • Competitive Analysis: I spent time looking at adjacent competitors like Verizon, AT&T, Comcast to see how they handle specific use cases. I also look at "best in class" eCommerce competitors like Amazon, Nike, Apple, etc.

   • Usability Studies: I lean on research conducted by either Nielsen Norman Group or Baymard to make sure what I am designing follows eCommerce best practice.

3. Ideation
   This is where I explore a few different design ideas via sketching and wireframing. I have a weekly touchpoint with our Product team to present different design options to get their feedback. During this time, I also lean on the Research I conducted to help influence which option I believe are the strongest.

4. User Testing
   Depending on the feature, we will conduct user testing via C Spire's Research team and Usertesting.com. Based on the testing, we will then determine action items to change to the design and I work with Product to finalize the requirements and build out all use case scenarios for the designs.

5. Development Handoff
   Finally, I have weekly meetings with the Development team to walk through design changes and field any questions they have for me. During this step, I also make sure to update any new components into the design system.

final Designs

Results