OMS — CML

FULFILLMENT ORDER MGMT REDESIGN

Company

PrintversePro, PhotoUSA

Project duration: Q4 2021 - Q1 2022

Team

Engineer x 3

Product Designer x 1

Product Manager x 1

Role & Type

Lead designer

Web design

Project Overview

An order management dashboard designed for the fulfillment center to receive-produce-pack-ship orders during the pandemic holiday season.

Client

Printverse is a B2B & B2C e-commerce sublimation supplier that provides print-on-demand and drop shipping business for online marketplaces (e.g Zazzle, RedBubble, Printify, Walmart).

My Role

I worked on user research, site mapping, and design iterations, and I was also part of the team building the front end for the product.

Goal

Our Fulfillment Center’s platform needed a long-overdue makeover. This project redesigned the experience for our internal users while creating an innovative B2B fulfillment experience for customers.

Results

QC & Packaging error reduced by 65%
Order processing time shortened by 26 hours
Customer complaints related to order status were reduced by 30%
95% of users claimed this website has resolved their existing problems
98% of new users are able to navigate without any problem

Problem Statement

“92% of orders during the holiday were facing late delivery, how can we improve the dashboard to better assist our Fulfillment team? As well as reducing QC errors and expediting production efficiency?

Discovery Research

Emphasize with user

I think there is no better way than being the user self to be in the same shoes!

I decided to be a 4-week production worker & assistant during the holiday peak season, to experience the same problems users are facing.

I talked to the production manager to introduce me to the fulfillment center & team, get to know all personnel and understand the full cycle of the detailed process of how an order is being produced. I specified to the manager that I should be treated as a normal new worker. A current worker was assigned to train me to be able to perform tasks such as: producing, packing, QC, shipping, and managing orders on the Order Management System

Discovery Research

User demographics

The majority of users in our fulfillment team have low English literacy and low computer literacy.

User findings can be applied to the design later:

Choose the right words for buttons, labeling, text
Icon and image are preferred
Instruction and helps
Offer detailed instructions when errors occur
Categorize errors with color
Avoid advanced/modern interaction, quick and simple is better

Discovery Research

Survey

To gain a baseline metrics evaluation of the product, and collect missing or undercover problems, I first conducted a company-wise online questionnaire (I’m glad 86% responded).

Discovery Research

Usability Test & Interviews

I conducted 6 usability tests with new users to assess if users can perform essential tasks with little or no training.

In interaction tasks, the majority of testers applied insufficient QC procedures and showed confusion when an error popped up. When asking users to find a page, the results show a high failure in navigation.

I had 4 focus group interviews with each department: sales, production, engineering, and customer success. Openly discussed the problems they encountered while using the system with valuable suggestions.

“Order reports run very slow, and I have to download every hour.”
- Donna, Fulfillment Lead
“Customers keep asking me about order status, however, I don’t have a way to find out after we start to produce.”
- Evelyn, Customer Success
“There is nothing to brag about to attract customers with slow order cycle time and low product quality. How are we beating our competitors?“
- Ed, Sales Manager

“I’d like to know the KPI, it helps improve our production flow and how to reduce costs.”
- Doug, Operation Manager
“We can’t keep up with the volume, it looks like a labor shortage but I know there is potential to improve productivity.”
- Ricardo, Fulfillment Manager
“The website was built 5 years without UX/UI design applied, all the features added are stacked on top of each other.”
- Andy, Engineer

Pain Points

Evaluate current design

Our current dashboard only met the bare minimum of an order management system. The pain points mainly exist in 2 parts:

Order shipping interface
Order management report interface

Redesign

Workflow

Information Architecture

I see this problem as a communication issue as well, as we are not updating the order status to our internal team.

I noticed that once an order hits the production floor, it’s basically gone missing. It could be made defective, or broken in packing, or simply get lost, and those performances can’t be fixed in a day or two.

I suggested adding at least 1 more status to the process, so our system can track the order status.

I reorganized the messy information architecture by open card sorting with the teams.

I asked users to categorize by priority, similarity, and features they thought should belong there. By learning about their mental modal, I had a better understanding of how users think of the system.