Alibaba.com is the leading platform for global wholesale trade, connecting over 200,000 merchants with 30 million customers worldwide. Many merchants, often lacking design expertise, historically faced challenges in creating professional digital storefronts. The platform also hosts the Elite Partner Event each month, spotlighting premium products from top-tier merchants in specific industries. The market team collaborates 1-on-1 with these suppliers to develop event pages, though this process has been somewhat inefficient.

In 2022, I stepped into the role of the first and only UX designer on the team, with a focus on developing SaaS templates. This initiative marked a significant shift, empowering merchants to independently create and manage their storefronts and event pages, thereby enhancing their product visibility and boosting sales.

• Empowered over 200,000 merchants to independently build professional storefronts and event pages.
• Accelerated the monthly design cycle, reducing it from 3 weeks to just 1.5 weeks.

• Led the design of SaaS templates tailored for industries such as beauty, apparel, and machinery, optimized for both desktop and mobile websites.
• Established a comprehensive design system to streamline team workflow and ensure consistency across the platform.
• Created detailed specifications for developers to facilitate accurate implementation of the SaaS templates.

There were two projects that assigned to me: providing one-on-one design services to selected merchants for the monthly Elite Partner Event and developing SaaS templates for over 200,000 merchant storefronts.

Recognizing the opportunity to create a unified solution for both tasks, I proposed adopting an Atomic design system approach to create user-friendly SaaS templates. Starting with the smallest elements and components, I ensured that the templates would:

• Enable 200,000 merchants to easily create their storefronts while maintaining high quality.
• Make the monthly one-on-one design service for the Elite Partner Event more efficient.
• Ensure consistency across our platform.

In the long run, we can transition to giving merchants more freedom to create their own event pages while playing a support role instead of designing everything for them, ultimately saving the team time.

Most merchants on Alibaba are local factories from Asia, who always have limited or no design expertise. The current SaaS templates feature only limited product sections, failing to meet their comprehensive needs. As a result, numerous merchants turn to freelancers to produce static images to showcase their services and products. Unfortunately, these images are not interactive and fail to convey a professional look, reducing their ability to attract customers and boost sales effectively.

To ensure that our templates are both functional and adaptable, and to align with the expectations of our stakeholders, I've established a set of design principles through internal discussions.

Adapted from Atomic Design principles, I established the foundation of our design system with core "atoms" like typography, colors, buttons, spacing, and components. To enhance customization, I invited our visual designers to contribute by creating and documenting text styles and color palettes tailored to various industries, empowering merchants to personalize their storefronts while maintaining a consistent, professional look.

With over 30 million buyers spanning hundreds of industries, my initial challenge was to identify universal needs that could be addressed systematically. Through a meticulous re-analysis of the research reports (provided by our sister team), I identified three key customer needs that consistently emerged across diverse customer types: Quality, Service, and Price. It helped me understand the varying priorities among our customers:

• Special customers, such as those purchasing large equipment and raw materials, primarily prioritize product quality.
• Large-scale retailers and service providers, who typically shop for customized items like electronic products and vehicle parts, look for a balance of product quality and seller service.
• Manufacturers, who procure a mix of customized and ready-to-ship items, from textiles to daily necessities, tend to focus on competitive pricing and reliable service.
• Wholesalers and small retailers, dealing in standardized industrial parts, prioritize product pricing.

To identify the essential components and sections for our template library, I began by evaluating how our merchants currently address primary buyer needs and studied the best practices among industry leaders.

Subsequently, I organized similar sections into categories and developed a comprehensive library of versatile components and sections. I also produced detailed specifications to facilitate a smooth handoff of these elements to the developers. By maintaining close communication with the developers, I ensured that each element was implemented accurately, aligning perfectly with our design intentions.

Moving into designing templates tailored to various industries, I prioritized understanding the specific and nuanced needs of each industry's customers. For instance, in the Machinery sector, I interviewed industry experts, then developed detailed user personas and pinpointed what is the key criteria for these customers to make purchases. This sets the foundation for my template design.

After identifying the key criteria for Machinery customers to make purchases, I accessed the section library I had previously developed to select relevant sections. Concurrently, I conducted a competitive analysis to identify best practices and effective design strategies specifically tailored to this industry. Through internal discussions and iterations, I ensured that these templates:

• Align with customer needs
• Incorporate diverse section layouts to prevent monotony and maintain high user engagement
• Are visually appealing and engaging across different screen sizes
• Provide visual designers with color scheme recommendations

As the wireframe template is refined, I hand it over to the visual designers for further visual enhancement.

Despite proposing direct user interviews and garnering interest through our monthly email newsletter, we encountered a financial constraint. As part of the marketing team, which had never previously supported user interviews, we lacked the necessary funds for participant incentives.

To navigate this challenge, I implemented a Plan B: I revisited relevant research reports from other teams and arranged discussions with them to deepen our understanding. Although relying on secondary research was not ideal, it was a pragmatic solution given our limited time and resources. This approach allowed us to make incremental progress toward better understanding and serving our users.

Reflecting on this experience, I recognize the importance of proactive engagement with key stakeholders. In future projects, I would approach the marketing head directly at the project's inception to discuss the benefits of investing in user research, using competitor success stories to bolster the case for budget allocation.