PROJECT: Barnes & Noble College (BNED) —
eCommerce Strategy + Site Redesign for BNED Campus Bookstores
eCommerce Strategy + Site Redesign for BNED Campus Bookstores
ROLE:
Principal Sr. UX Designer at BNED working on responsive website redesign, product innovation ideation, competitive analysis and industry benchmarking.
KEY SKILLS / DELIVERABLES:
• Big-Picture Services Ideation
• eCommerce Research + Strategy
• Extensive Content Strategy
• Detailed Annotated Wireframes
• Product Detail Page Design
• Personalization + Persona-Segmentation Strategy
DESIGN APPS USED:
• Sketch (detailed UX Designs)
• Axure (interactive prototyping)
PROJECT OVERVIEW / CONTEXT:
Introduced bluesky Sketch concepts illustrating potential services for college bookstores with personalized course management, tourism and events-based community development, centralized FAQs help center, philanthropic concepts, lifetime learning and networking features for on-campus and virtual students, parents, and alumni. Wrote competitive landscape and eCommerce features analyses and recommendations documents for VP of Product and eCommerce directors to be used in their company strategy presentations and requirements gathering. Conceptualized and produced Sketch wireframes prototyping responsive web user-experience designs. Wrote annotations describing proposed features for eCommerce solution.
Created info architecture and interactive Axure responsive web prototypes proposing megamenus, typeahead search strategy, UX flows for course materials lookup and apparel and memorabilia purchases. I taught myself Axure and within a week, building interacting menus for proposed sitemaps and megamenus.
Collaborated with internal BNED UX and Smith Consulting fusion team to conceptualize, design and develop new eCommerce site templates for Barnes & Nobles College / BNED campus bookstores.
Represented here are my annotated wireframe concepts proposing desktop and mobile designs that feature my proposals for homepage dashboards for different personas; global nav and mega menus; product results; quick-glance product pop-ups; shopping cart, etc.
Featured above are my sample annotated wireframe concepts proposing desktop and mobile designs that feature:
1) Concepts for homepage dashboards for different personas;
2) Global nav and mega menus; product results;
3) Quick-glance product pop-ups;
4) Shopping cart
1) Concepts for homepage dashboards for different personas;
2) Global nav and mega menus; product results;
3) Quick-glance product pop-ups;
4) Shopping cart
Sample eCommerce wireframes of the responsive webpage that I proposed, designed, and prototyped in Axure featuring functionality for the "Your Shopping Cart" and "Find Course Material" pages. They describe my proposed functionality for adding books and other course materials assigned to students from their syllabi for each class they have enrolled. Some universities have multiple campuses in which students could select materials which my design accounts for those scenarios. When students or alumni add items to their cart, they will see a mini-cart update to verify their selections.
When students or alumni add items to their cart, they will see a mini-cart update to verify their selections.
My proposed desktop display of the Shopping Cart capabilities. I prototyped this in Axure.
My proposed mobile display of the Shopping Cart capabilities. I prototyped this in Axure. This is the default view of the cart total (collapsed state)
This is the cart view with the total price and order summary details on promos are open when users tap the tab to view order summary.
My proposed functionality for adding books and other course materials assigned to students from their syllabi for each class they have enrolled. Some universities have multiple campuses in which students could select materials which my design accounts for those scenarios. The course term (e.g. fall, winter, spring, summer) is set to the chronologically nearest term as default and students in this screen are at the point where they can select a department or a discipline for a course in which they have enrolled. Once a course has been selected, I recommended that it verifies the title of the course. This will also lead to the course number being updated automatically to include only the options associated with that courses and their associated numbers available for that discipline.
My Sample Discovery Phase Research and Analysis Artifacts (pdfs) that I Created:
I analyzed the site features and service offerings for various eCommerce and eCommunity sites for inspiration for potential approaches we could take with BNED and compiled them in a PPT document (PDF).
I reviewed various books and eZines publishing houses to compile a list of notable interactive functionality, site features, and high-level service ideas that we could potentially consider and expound upon for our BNED site.
Following my initial competitive analysis of the eCommerce and publishing houses, I wrote up my proposal to the VP of Product and eCommerce directors on my recommendations for site enhancements and bigger-picture, blue ocean opportunities.
