Ayodeji - Senior Product Design Leader with Experience in Low Code Development

Eko Hub

eCommerce

Eko Hub

eCommerce

Eko Hub

eCommerce

Eko Hub

eCommerce

Buy, Sell, Connect

The Product:

Lead designer

I conducted interviews, paper and digital wireframing, low and high-fidelity prototyping, usability studies, accounting for accessibility and iterating on designs.

EkoHub is an E-Commerce product that deals with buying and selling online. It serves its customers with real-time connections, and the ability to open stores easily and fast online.

Background Research:

Methodological approach was taken to this non-linear design process.

I had to understand the problem statement by deep diving into the industry challenges.

I realised that these 3-anchor points; Financial inclusion, mobile app penetration, and banking are all critical components of Nigeria's financial ecosystem.

While progress has been made in increasing financial inclusion and mobile app usage, there is still a significant gap to close.

In the world:
As of 2020, there are roughly 7.8 billion people in the world. And just over a quarter (26.28 per cent) of them are online shoppers. As you can see, there's been a considerable increase in the number of digital shoppers over the years, where it's climbed from 1.32 billion in 2014 to 2.05 billion in 2020.

In Nigeria:
In 2020, the number of online buyers in Nigeria was about 76.7 million. Nigeria's total population amounts to 206 million and the internet penetration is at about 46 per cent

The Problem:

From the research carried our, I discovered a problem

As a Nigerian, it's easy to see the challenges faced by buyers and sellers, and with a lot of research and findings obtained from individuals, a couple of questions came to mind.

How can people buy and sell commodities in the easiest way possible?"

"How can buyers meet sellers without even having to leave their homes or residence?".

As a Nigerian, I figured the reason why most people aren't able to push their product is due to the expense and cost it will take to move it into the market. Nigeria has a very rough physical marketplace that discourages people from opening shops, as the cost of owning a shop might be unbearable.

As a Nigerian, it's easy to see the challenges faced by buyers and sellers, and with a lot of research and findings obtained from individuals, a couple of questions came to mind.

How can people buy and sell commodities in the easiest way possible?"

"How can buyers meet sellers without even having to leave their homes or residence?".

Solving the problem:

Now I began to immerse myself into the ways to solve the problem. One major way is using divergent method of thinking.

To tackle this discomfort and hardship, people want to be able to buy and sell at their convenience, without stress.

So we propose to build a digital product that can give them the platform to buy, sell, keep tabs on their product's engagement with buyers, and have a feature to enable them to communicate in real-time with their customers.

Research and insights:

Criteria for participants for the user interview were as follows:

Individuals between the ages of 18 - 50, technologically knowledgeable, married or single.

Interviewees must be domiciled in Nigeria or have lived in Nigeria for most of their life.

Must have a running business with at least 1-year of experience.

The goal of design research is to inform the design process from the perspective of the end-user. As an average Nigerian, I could empathise with the problem stated above but I need to ensure design decisions are from the user's view of the design solution.

Firstly, we need to know "Who will be using our products?", "Who is our Target audience?". These are the first questions to ask ourselves. From research data in Nigeria, the highest age band of internet users are between the ages of 18-50. These age brackets are known to be quite familiar with the internet. They are in the category of college students and workers. There might be people that are older than this class of users, but the majority of the users will sit at this range.

UX research has two parts: gathering data from the user, and then synthesizing that data to understand and make guided design decisions.

I chose to gather qualitative insight from the target user segment. I chose this method of research because it enables me to ask open-ended questions and understand the pain points and motivations of the users.

Meet Deji Ajayi

“I want to be able to sell and communicate with my buyers, having to understand them properly will go a long way in helping my sales.”

Age: 30
Occupation: Online Trader
Location: Lagos, Nigeria
Shopping Pattern: Daily Shopper

Frustrations:

Difficulties opening stores.
Products not getting enough audience.

Goals:

Fast deliveries on my products.
Real-time communication with potential buyers.

Meet Sarah Olaiya

“i’m not an everyday shopper but i want to be satisfied whenever i get to want to purchase any product.”

Age: 23
Occupation: Content creator
Location: Lagos, Nigeria
Shopping Pattern: Weekly shopper

Frustrations:

Purchasing something and getting something else.
Not being able to track my product’s movement.

Goals:

Fast deliveries on my products.
Dont want a situation of “what i ordered” vs “what i got”.

Pain points

After conducting the interview, I was able to draft some statements and pain points from the interviewees.

Visibility:

Participants complained about not being able to advertise their products.

Interaction:

Participants would want to be able to connect with their customers in real-time.

Stress:

Participants complained of the stress it takes to go to market.

Safety:

Participants expressed their fear of theft and hijackers.

Scalability:

Participants want to be able to set up stores.

Pain points

After conducting the interview, I was able to draft some statements and pain points from the interviewees.

Visibility:

Participants complained about not being able to advertise their products.

Interaction:

Participants would want to be able to connect with their customers in real-time.

Stress:

Participants complained of the stress it takes to go to market.

Safety:

Participants expressed their fear of theft and hijackers.

Scalability:

Participants want to be able to set up stores.

UX flows and IA:

Mapping Dele’s user journey revealed how helpful it would be for users to have access to the EkoHub platform.

Goal: I want to be able to sell and communicate with my buyers, having to understand them properly will go a long way in helping my sales

Mapping Dele’s user journey revealed how helpful it would be for users to have access to the EkoHub platform.

Goal: I want to be able to sell and communicate with my buyers, having to understand them properly will go a long way in helping my sales

Mapping Dele’s user journey revealed how helpful it would be for users to have access to the EkoHub platform.

Goal: I want to be able to sell and communicate with my buyers, having to understand them properly will go a long way in helping my sales

Mapping Dele’s user journey revealed how helpful it would be for users to have access to the EkoHub platform.

Goal: I want to be able to sell and communicate with my buyers, having to understand them properly will go a long way in helping my sales

Wireframes and sketches:

This prepared a strong foundation for high fidelity designs.

We drafted iterations of each screen of the app on paper to ensure that the elements that made it to the final digital wireframes would be well-detailed to address user pain points.

Design System:

Final design:

After so much work on research, insights and creating wireframes, it was time for the visual design. Designing this we kept our users in mind and made sure we made use of trendy and up-to-date design methods.

We made sure to do our designs in stages to help us carefully and critically work in order of plan.

The Results

After research and designing, it was time to test the product for proper functionality. We did these in three stages:

Before development (figma designs)
In-development (staging)
Post-development (production)

We had several sessions with individuals and entrepreneurs to test the product with. We made sure to collect feedback on the product and seek out opportunities.

After research and designing, it was time to test the product for proper functionality. We did these in three stages:

Before development (figma designs)
In-development (staging)
Post-development (production)

We had several sessions with individuals and entrepreneurs to test the product with. We made sure to collect feedback on the product and seek out opportunities.

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