Feature Design for Bdok

This is the first part of my journey that I'd like to share with you. I write or design some of my experiences in various formats, hoping it will be useful for you. Due to time constraints, I may not be able to present my best self, but it's important for me to write my experiences in a committed way.

In this section, I will discuss designing a new feature for the Bdok product. As someone who has worked in different organizations, I always try to help different departments within the organization.

In early winter, there was heavy snowfall and the traffic was very heavy. While riding in a Snapp! (a ride-sharing app), I was thinking about the concerns of my company's customers and noticed an advertisement on one of the buses with the words "Economical", "Easy", and "Efficient". Storm of words and ideas formed in my mind.

This mental image and the snowy, traffic-filled atmosphere ultimately led to the discovery of a new feature for our product. This feature allows users to easily and quickly create and optimize their own advertisements without leaving their store management panel, resulting in better performance.

This idea came from the personal needs of customers who were looking to improve their advertising and store performance, and it became a valuable feature. Overall, this experience shows that sometimes having enough focus and an open mind can lead to innovative ideas in any situation.

The change of Bdok’s strategy from serving SMB to Enterprise companies made us decide to turn our experiences in product design & management into a collection of narratives for raising awareness with an educational flavor.

Bdok: Ad-Automation feature

Role: Product Manager (Ideation, Research, UX)

Challenge: Developing a new feature to simplify advertising management for online shops on Bdok platform

Time: 50 hours over 3 weeks

Status: Pending, due to a major change in the organization's strategy.

The Story behind the product

Our clients at Bdok in order to advertise their products effectively through a company like Yektanet, business owners need to have at least basic knowledge of digital marketing. To facilitate this process, we have designed the "Advertising Automation" feature, so that customers can create, optimize, and publish their product ads in their Bdok shop management panel without the need for deep technical knowledge.  

• Ads Automation feature uses AI to create ads quickly and efficiently.
• The AI checks the impact of ads over time and provides suggestions for modification.
• This feature saves customers time and money while increasing the effectiveness of their advertising.

Empathize

“Design thinking is about empathy for people, understanding their needs, and finding solutions that work for them.” - Tim Brown

The power of secondary research in decision-making

is when you use information that has already been collected by someone else. It's like going to the library or searching online for information on a topic instead of doing your own experiments or surveys. You can learn a lot from secondary research, but you have to make sure the information is reliable and relevant to your project.  

Let's delve into the following research inquiries:  

• What is the current state of online advertising in the Iranian market?
• How can we simplify and make online advertising more efficient for Bidel users?
• What are the challenges and problems for online stores in creating and managing advertisements?
• What is the difference between using advertising automation and directly using Yektanet and Google Ads?

Insights and Analysis: An In-Depth Look at the Industry

• 55% of digital advertising in Iran is done through news websites and social media.
• The growth rate of online advertising in Iran was about 60% in 2019 compared to 2018.
• Iranian companies have limited advertising tools, such as Google AdWords, available to them.
• The Iranian e-commerce market is continuously growing at an annual growth rate of around 20%.

Uncovering Insights: Conducting Personal Interviews

We have identified four hypotheses to be confirmed through secondary research:

• Advertisers prefer a simple and efficient method for creating online ads.
• Most online advertising is done through Google Ads and Yektanet.
• Advertisers spend a considerable amount of time creating online ads.
• Advertisers are interested in using a tool that automates the creation of online ads.

We selected customers with the highest product sales and who have used online advertising tools for interviews.

Empathy Map

User Persona

"The best solution to a problem is to define better questions."

Define

Reframe challenge based on empathy. Ready for ideation.

POV Statement & HMW 

Brainstorming

We had a brainstorming session, generated many ideas and organized them. Others perspectives helped create new ideas. It's crucial for developing functional features.

User, Business & Technical Goals

First, I checked where business and user goals overlap. Then, I reviewed project and user data from primary and secondary research. Finally, I combined them with technical considerations to create a diagram for business goals before starting Bdok's design challenge.

High Fidelity Wireframes

We developed high-fidelity wireframes and added annotations to create comprehensive documentation on how the new feature would fit into the current interface.

I will continue this content, for now, it's enough until here.

Takeaway form this article:

Being flexible and adaptable is crucial in the ever-evolving business landscape. Organizations may need to shift their focus or change their strategy due to market conditions or customer needs, which can impact ongoing projects or features. It is important to avoid getting attached to a specific idea or feature and remain open to redirection of resources and priorities.

External Resources:

• Woman Photo for persona
• Man Photo for Persona