Utilizing user data compiled by focus groups and customer support data, I created multiple user personas to help facilitate a baseline stakeholder group for all current and future designs.
I also cultivated the idea of stakeholder reliance at Openn, showcasing a unique situation where users’ needs and vulnerabilities directly impacted each other.
All sensitive information is blurred in terms with NDA.
Personas are a hallmark of user research but I’ve always found that the best, most genuine opinions come from live user focus groups.
Our focus groups consisted of realtors from state-level MLS groups, such as California Regional Multiple Listing Service (CRMLS). We walked each group through a demo of our product with both Figma prototypes and the actual webpage, looking for any spots for feedback and criticism we could use in our next iterations.
We also made use of journey maps to organize our personas and gain a better understanding of how they were going to use our product.
This process was influenced directly by our focus group candidates, as we ended up using their answers as a baseline to form the moments in our map and using their reactions and tone to help formulate the emotions our users were giving off.
Agent Journey: First Offer to Close
[COPY: persona name]
DISCOVER
UPLOAD OFFER
COMPARE OFFERS
STAY UPDATED
ACTIONS
Gets invited by their brokerage and signs in for the first time
Uploads a buyer’s offer and contract details
Reviews and compares multiple offers on a property
Checks in on property updates and offer activity
TOUCHPOINTS
Email invite
Upload flow
Offers table
Dashboard
EMOTIONS
Curious
Frustrated
Overwhelmed
Confident
PAIN POINTS
Unsure where to start
Multi-page form, easy to lose your place
Digging through contracts, exporting to spreadsheets
Missing updates since last login
OPPORTUNITIES
Clear first-run guidance
Accordion upload in a modal
Offer Cards + filterable offer display
Stacking notification dashboard
Utilizing user data compiled by focus groups and customer support data, I created multiple user personas to help facilitate a baseline stakeholder group for all current and future designs.
I also cultivated the idea of stakeholder reliance at Openn, showcasing a unique situation where users’ needs and vulnerabilities directly impacted each other.
All sensitive information is blurred in terms with NDA.
04 — Takeaways
Off the top of my head, I can list a few key aspects of my work that changed with this position. I learned to listen more effectively and was forced to communicate much more than I was used to since my review meetings were large and very opinionated. In the future, I hope to hone that communication to efficiently process criticism and convert it into meaningful design adjustments.
Another big change I dealt with was the pacing of a startup workload. Creating and applying a design process in a busy, industrial setting was difficult at first but eventually gave me the foundation to work on projects back to back so effectively I was often ahead of schedule.
Ultimately, I felt as if I grew here as a designer much more in terms of design theory and structure rather than raw skill. Truthfully, I came here to lift Openn’s design aesthetic into something with a more modern feel while also improving its usability - and I learned just how much of a challenge that can be.
“It’s very easy to be different, but very difficult to be better.”
John Ive