Consumer-to-consumer listing flow

Description

The consumer-to-consumer listing flow is a short and quick listing tool catering to the needs of new, occasional, and casual sellers (C2C sellers). Pricing and shipping guidances are displayed during the listing process of any specific item in an effort to remove selling pain points. As people use multiple devices to list their items, the listing form instantly syncs up between desktop and mobile, and offers the possibility to automatically upload photos from a mobile device to the listing form on desktop.

My role

Project lead, responsible for the creation of flows & wireframes, interaction & visual design, information architecture, specs and guidelines, and for mentoring junior designers.

Problem statement

New, occasional and casual sellers—80% of all sellers on eBay—were still using eBay’s outdated classic listing experience. This listing tool was not tailored to the needs of this user segment (C2C sellers). It was extremely confusing and time consuming, and wasn’t available on mobile devices. Additionally, the lack of guidance for pricing an item and shipping methods caused many sellers to abandon the flow before completion. Even if they could complete their listings, the process used to be painful and frustrating.

Consumer-to-consumer listing flow - flow diagram

Process

The goal of this project was to create a quick and easy listing tool that provides guidance and includes the minimal set of features necessary to make C2C sellers successful on eBay.

Analytical data showed that more than 10% of users were trying to list on mWeb rather than on the app, and it was obvious that we needed to create a multi-screen experience to satisfy those users. However, the creation of a responsive experience was not on the roadmap. I partnered closely with an engineer to create an adaptive live prototype, which we used as demo to pitch the concept to senior executives. Subsequently, the project was ranked as high-priority.

While designing the listing form, I also mentored two junior designers who were tasked to design the landing page and the category selection page.

Rapid proof of concept of a hybrid hub-and-spoke model, which we ended up not using because of performance and usability concerns

Listing landing page on desktop and mobile

Consumer-to-consumer listing form on desktop and mobile

Photo sync up between devices

About 30% of people list items on multiple devices. A typical scenario is a seller starting a listing on desktop, then taking pictures on a smartphone, uploading them to the cloud, and finally downloading the pictures to the form on desktop again. In collaboration with the mobile development team, we designed a tool that allows an immediate photo sync-up between devices. After a seller clicks on "Add photos from my phone" on the form on desktop, a notification is sent to the mobile device with a description on how to add photos to the listing directly from the phone. The photos taken on the phone are then instantly synced up with the form on desktop.

Outcome

Multiple UER sessions helped us iterate on the design. During the latest sessions some participants commented that listing an item on eBay was easier and faster than what they had expected. Some prefered the mobile version to the app.

The project was released incrementally in 2013. It was the first adaptive flow on eBay and was acclaimed as one of the top achievements for the company in 2013. Completion rate on mWeb outperformed the app.

Listing success page