Tech Mania
AliExpress, Alibaba
A monthly e-commerce promotion for Tech lovers to explore hidden gems
As the lead product designer and production manager, I found an opportunity for a monthly promotion, Tech Mania, and refined its design, which led to a 37% increase in sales.
About
Mania is a monthly e-commerce promotion targeting small and medium-sized enterprises on AliExpress, an overseas product of Alibaba. It offers products to 150+ million international online buyers in 18 languages across the web and app platforms.
Time
April, 2021 (3 weeks)
The Results
01 37% increase in sale
02 High-quality mass design production accomplished in 2 weeks
03 The design strategy was applied to another promotion, Home Mania
My Roles
I was in charge of this monthly promotion as the product designer and design manager.
*Final templates for the auto mass production. Default texts are used within the images as placeholders.".
Problem Framing
The argument: Super Tech Sale or Tech Mania?
When I first joined the project, my two stakeholders, the Business PM and the Content Designer, disagreed with the name of this monthly promotion. The Content Designer proposed to change the promotion event, Super Tech Sale, into Tech Mania, while the Business PM preferred remaining its name as Super Tech Sale.
01 Understanding
I started with understanding the rationales behind my stakeholders' opinions.
1. Business PM | 🇨🇳 ex.Taobao, rich experience in China e-commerce
|“Super Tech Sale is better for our sales".
· Changing the name is risky for the current business
Our sales now are about average, it's too risky to change the name to "Mania".
· Preferred by SMEs in China
Small & Mid-size Enterprises in China prefer "Super" and "Sale", they don't understand "Mania"
· Proven success by Taobao
The success of Taobao has proved that "Super" and "Sale" are effective for e-commerce
2. Content Designer | 🇺🇸 Rich experience for western brands
|“Tech Mania is more attractive to western shoppers".
·
Current name is not attractive to western audiences
Super Tech Sales is too Chinglish and tedious for western shoppers. They prefer something more lifestyle, like Tech Mania
02 Investigating
I first analyzed our current name, Super Tech Sales, through the lens of the platform, AliExpress, the business, Small & Mid-size Enterprises in China, and the audiences, western shoppers.
1. The platform | AliExpress
|Lost in a platform full of “Super” and famous “Sale”.
There were so many promotions and events with the family name of "Super", for instance, Super Deals, Super Brand Day, and Super Brand Week. What is more, AliExpress is a platform with many famous sales, such as Double 11, Black Friday, and June 18 Sale. Unfortunately, our event was not one of them. These made it hard for our promotion to be noticed on the platform.
2. The business | Small & mid-size enterprises in China
|Less “Super” brands, providing limited discounts in the “Sale”.
Less well-known, few user reviews, messy categories, limited discount
Compared to big brands with good reputations, such as Xiaomi and Huawei, our small & mid-size enterprises are less "Super." Our current name, Super Tech Sale, was not appropriate for them.
3. The audiences | Western shoppers
|Messy + Sale = Not attractive
|Messy + Few Reviews + Super Sale + Tech = Not reliable!
According to customer reviews and annual reports, audiences already have a bias on countless events called "sale". Besides the fact that events with the family name of sale are seen every day on our platform, they also complain that many products in these promotions are not actually on sale.
What is more, if a promotional event related to tech products is called Super Sale, and there are few reviews to convince them, they'll think it not reliable.
*Two negative perceptions of western customers about AliExpress:
ongoing sales with doubtable prices, messy as small Asian markets. (2020 AliExpress annual report)
03 Opportunities
My secondary research (AliExpress customer reports, competitor reports) gave me some clues.
Key Findings | TA, 21- 32 years old Western Shoppers
01 Higher tolerance in prices and brands
02 More interested in themed scenarios and unique products
Our target audiences, 21- 32 years old Western Shoppers, are willing to pay more for unique products they are interested in. E-commerce events with themed scenarios are more attractive to them.
Problems
Less famous high-quality products
Messy categories
Limited discounts
Features
Selected treasure products
Rich categories
Reasonable prices
What if we turn current problems into our features,
And create a special space for tech lovers to discover our products?
04 Design Strategy
Turning our monthly promotion into a space for tech lovers to discover our products.
·
Tech Mania, a space to explore hidden tech gems
To help my Business PM explain the change to our small & mid-size enterprises, I also provided two suggestions.
01
We are repositioning our event rather than simply renaming it.
02
Explain "Mania" in a similar context in China with e-commerce examples.
Design Solutions
Design Goals
Creating an engaging space for tech lovers to explore treasure products while considering the project deadline, budget, 18 language scenarios, and technical constraints on the platform.
01 Art Direction
Crafting an engaging space for Tech Mania
02 Mass Production (Templates)
Adaptable to 18 languages
Efficient within “platform frames”
03 Production Management
Mentoring fellow designers
Ensuring agreeable design output
01 Art Direction
How to crafting an engaging space for Tech Mania?
1. Visual Design
Creating an engaging context rather than a sale banner
| Theme + Message +Scenario
·
*Example: Event Entrance
(Left) Another promotion on AliExpress (Right) Tech ManiaRight
Example: Components for different types of products
(Left) Top brands (Mid) Selected gems (Right) Unique features
2. Motion Design
Enhancing a sense of space with animations
| Hierarchy, Rhythm, Time & Size
Hierarchy | Business needs
What do we want to highlight within audiences' limited attention to our entrance? Event logo + call-to-action > Products > background image.
Rhythm |Visual communication
How should I show our space to our audiences? The depth, Z space, then the scale, X space.
Time & Size|Technical constraints
How long should I craft this motion story and what kind of animation should I use to make sure the file size works within technical constraints?
*Default text for testing
03 Mass Production (Templates)
Here are some examples of how I designed templates for the mass production system adaptable to 18 language scenarios, efficient within “platform frames” meanwhile considering budget and business needs.
1. Adaptable to 18 languages
| Space
*Example from a recent promotion on AliExpress
| Alignment
In some cultures, characters are aligned on the right. This kind of layout requires two templates.
*Example from a recent promotion on AliExpress
| Height
But aligned in the middle does not solve all the problems. Sometimes it requires more height, which is more precious.
*Example from a recent promotion on AliExpress
· My Solution ·
According to the business needs and the product features, customize the alignment and the height of top visuals for different pages.
Example: Key visuals for different pages (*Default text)
(Left) Highlighting brands (Mid) Highlighting products (Right) Highlighting the event
2. Efficient within “platform frames”
On AliExpress, different components have different functions, for instance, format, time, and whether they can be linked to detail pages. My designs should play their roles within the constraints and maximize the features.
Here is an example of Splash Ad.
| Splash Ad ·
Splash Ad is a 3-secnd full-screen ad that appears on AliExpress at launch. It is not clickable or accessible to a product's detail page on AliExpress.
Example: Two Previous Versions (*Default text)
(Left) Too many messages for 3 seconds
(Right) Trying to highlight top products, but it cannot access product pages
· My Solution ·
According to the business needs and the product features, customize the alignment and the height of top visuals for different pages.
Keep the message clear and simple, meanwhile introducing the context, and indicating product categories.
Production Management
Mentoring Fellow Designers
All the fellow designers were from our remote vendor team. Typically, Sr. designers and the vendor team have limited conversations (mainly by texting in the system). To help the team grow and deliver agreeable designs, I tried the following ways.
01 More tutorials
Besides traditional design style guides, I also provided more guidance to help my vendor team grow. For instance, tutorials via zoom, instructions, and tips in design files.
02 More conversations with team members
Paying attention to each designer. Instead of merely typing feedback in the system, I tried to build more conversations with team members via quick video calls, to understand their problems and provide advice accordingly.
Reflections
01 Accessibility In Mass Production
In this project, some designs generated by the mass production system were not accessible. Since I couldn't oversee all the visuals in an event, it's essential to make sure the system and designing templates produce accessibility-friendly assets. If given more time, I would communicate more with developers to optimize the templates.
02 Efficiency In Multi-culture Collaborations
Since the business covers diverse markets, many of my stakeholders are from different regions. Besides, stakeholders have their vendor teams. Time differences across regional teams, the remote working model, and the complex team structure exposed more difficulties to this fast-paced e-commerce project. Efficiency in multi-culture collaboration is something I'd like to discuss further with my stakeholders.