Carwow
Carwow
Discovery for optimisation
Discovery for optimisation
Discovery for optimisation
My Role
Product & Service design
Industry
Automotive
Timeframe
5 weeks
Year
2025
Carwow is an online marketplace for buying and selling cars. It uses the reverse marketplace model to remove the need for customers to negotiate with dealers when buying or selling their cars, aiming to make the process quicker and fairer.
Carwow is an online marketplace for buying and selling cars. It uses the reverse marketplace model to remove the need for customers to negotiate with dealers when buying or selling their cars, aiming to make the process quicker and fairer.
What was the problem?
What was the problem?
I led the discovery process to figure out the problems that sellers and dealers were coming across when going though the whole sale process.
I led the discovery process to figure out the problems that sellers and dealers were coming across when going though the whole sale process.
Research process
Research process
The aim of the research was to deeply understand where the business needs to improve critical points in the seller and dealer journey. This meant speaking to customers, looking through reviews and past research, speaking to internal teams and benchmarking. This was not just re-thinking the web experience, but how it all came together outside of the internet, so part of the research was rooted within service design too.
The aim of the research was to deeply understand where the business needs to improve critical points in the seller and dealer journey. This meant speaking to customers, looking through reviews and past research, speaking to internal teams and benchmarking. This was not just re-thinking the web experience, but how it all came together outside of the internet, so part of the research was rooted within service design too.
Key discovery insights
Key discovery insights
I was able to extract quite a few assumptions for seller and dealer needs and pain points in order to successfully complete the task of selling or buying car. These would be prioritised based on business goals and tech restraints.
I was able to extract quite a few assumptions for seller and dealer needs and pain points in order to successfully complete the task of selling or buying car. These would be prioritised based on business goals and tech restraints.
Usability interview learnings
Usability interview learnings
I ran customer interviews to understand how customers are moving through and behaving while navigating through the wireframe. The findings revealed a few things that could still be explored and improved within the UI, such as the 'cancel sale' flow. The initial design (which was already built by another team) appeared to be confuding in terms of the hierarchy and made it hard to see the success message or the overall 'canceling' concept. So, I explored changing the language from 'cancel sale' to 'close this lising' which was much more on par with the way customers understoof the flow.
I ran customer interviews to understand how customers are moving through and behaving while navigating through the wireframe. The findings revealed a few things that could still be explored and improved within the UI, such as the 'cancel sale' flow. The initial design (which was already built by another team) appeared to be confuding in terms of the hierarchy and made it hard to see the success message or the overall 'canceling' concept. So, I explored changing the language from 'cancel sale' to 'close this lising' which was much more on par with the way customers understoof the flow.
UI & UX explorations
UI & UX explorations
I explored several solutions to the re-design and collaborated with another designer who was handing over this project to me. The re-design incorporated the improvements in the user testing and research discovery. It was an aim to move towards a new UI look, that emobied the recent re-brand by Ragged Edge.
I explored several solutions to the re-design and collaborated with another designer who was handing over this project to me. The re-design incorporated the improvements in the user testing and research discovery. It was an aim to move towards a new UI look, that emobied the recent re-brand by Ragged Edge.
Next steps - Design system
Next steps - Design system
There was a lot of opportunity to develop the design system and the component library.
There was a lot of opportunity to develop the design system and the component library.
Colour and logic systems
Colour and logic systems
I ran some accessibility tests in terms of the colours being used within the design system and found that it didn't quite meet the accessibility criteria and there was no logic oh how things worked within the library. So, I adjusted the colours, in this case, for the badges and also arranged them within colour-coded sections to create structure for logic an scalability.
I ran some accessibility tests in terms of the colours being used within the design system and found that it didn't quite meet the accessibility criteria and there was no logic oh how things worked within the library. So, I adjusted the colours, in this case, for the badges and also arranged them within colour-coded sections to create structure for logic an scalability.
Patterns
Patterns
As Carwow had a big team of designers, and the component library lacked some documentation and patterns, I looked at some inconsistencies, especially concerning the project I was working on. The example on the left shows a pattern that the design system did no possess, so I put together a flow within a bottom sheet (or modal) that could be re-used in a similar scenario where a confirmation message follows wth another potential action for the user.
As Carwow had a big team of designers, and the component library lacked some documentation and patterns, I looked at some inconsistencies, especially concerning the project I was working on. The example on the left shows a pattern that the design system did no possess, so I put together a flow within a bottom sheet (or modal) that could be re-used in a similar scenario where a confirmation message follows wth another potential action for the user.
Visual language
Visual language
As Carwow was in the midst of planning a UI refresh, following the re-brand, I explored the visual language of the design system by replacing icons with more intricate illustrations, acting as a visual cue to give better detail than an icon and guide the user. These were rendered with chatGPT as I created a prompt, which would then could build a whole illustration library.
As Carwow was in the midst of planning a UI refresh, following the re-brand, I explored the visual language of the design system by replacing icons with more intricate illustrations, acting as a visual cue to give better detail than an icon and guide the user. These were rendered with chatGPT as I created a prompt, which would then could build a whole illustration library.
© 2025 — Designed by Kristie
hello@kristiefigmints.com
© 2025 — Designed by Kristie
hello@kristiefigmints.com
© 2025 — Designed by Kristie
hello@kristiefigmints.com