Reflection – Visualization

Background

I recently started working at an Affiliate Marketing based Startup (people earn a commission every time  someone buys via the shopping link that they shared with them). The users are divided into 5 ‘categories’  based on the ‘transactions’ that happen via their links :  A1: 0-10 transactions, A2: 10-30, A3: 30-50, A4: 50- 100, Influencers: 100+. The focus is placed on the A4 and Influencer categories because it is assumed that  cashback/commission earning will remain a niche market in India for at least some time and hence the  objective should be to become the extensive sharers’ favorite deal site.   The challenge with focusing solely on deal sharers is that any change in the commission rates impacts them  substantially and hence our commission rates vis a vis our competitors is what determines our standing.  Further, the commission rates can be pushed up/down only by a small margin. This has led to a situation  where most deal sites appear strikingly similar. It is a daily struggle to keep our best customers from jumping  ship.

Challenge

As a newcomer in the field (I graduated in Philosophy), I could sense outright a stiffness in these  assumptions. It seemed like we were playing in too short a lane. Without much expertise and a clearly  defined problem, I had no option but to start with gaining an understanding of our users. I decided to focus  only on A1, A2, A3, and A4. I also added an ‘A0’ category: people who never shop via shared links (I picked  people from my own office for this.)     Tool Selection:     With some help from my manager, I started off with a rough plan: in-depth interviewing of 2 people from  each category, and instead of making over-simplified, discrete conclusions like our Customer Relations team,  I will try to ‘connect’ the individual interviews to generate insights. I would use ‘Visualization’ and a bit of  ‘Mind Mapping’ to synthesize this wide information.     Tool approach and application:    In an attempt to gain unique insights, interviews were loosely structured. I transferred each interview onto a  whiteboard, with every piece of key information acting as a ‘chunk’  and then forcing myself to ‘link’ these  different chunks. I would go back to ask specific questions until each interview seemed sufficiently  connected. (Example: In A1, ‘Amit shares the very first shopping link that he came across’ was ‘linked’ to him  having a basic mobile on which he couldn’t explore all the options, and not  to the fact that ‘our users are  only interested in sharing the best deal overall’ as our Customers Team had always concluded)  We already knew that most of our users were students in the age group of 18-24 looking for alternate/easy  sources of income and that all shared roughly the same number of links per day (3-4) and shared on the  same platform: WhatsApp, except A4 (which also shared on Telegram). The interviews revealed that the real  differentiator was the ‘time and energy invested’, A1 users were simply sharing links, without modification,  mostly in generic WhatsApp groups, whereas people in A2, A3, A4 customized their sharing links for  individuals (example: sharing a link of sunglasses with a friend obsessed with them). Further, there were  clear differences in the online presence of the categories. Most in A4 had a substantial online presence  (regular posting of articles and news accompanied by lengthy personal opinions). They were also very active  on LinkedIn. They were the ‘Advice givers’. Each category had a ‘Persona’.   The Visualization process led me to conclude that A1 users were simply not considered an authority on deals.  On the other hand, A4 users were good recommenders, they seemed genuinely interested in passing on the  best deal to a particular person. “We need to trust the source” was my one-liner insight. Now, this needed to  make sense in relation to the company’s model, goals, resources, etc. Everything was brought together; the

printouts of their social media, the company’s vision statement, the competitors’ website, the screenshots of  shared links, etc.   I concluded that it wouldn’t be wise to make big changes based on these ‘personas’ because we simply didn’t  have enough data, but we could use this insight to gradually change our brand- narrative because no data  can alter humans’ psychological need for reliance and authority. Since we couldn’t predict, decide, or alter  the authority wielded by the ‘link sharers’, we could ourselves become the ‘authority’ on the best deals.   This would do two things, first, it would allow us to step out of the rat-race of commission rates because all  that matters to the end-users is a good product with a good discount. Second, it will reduce our reliance on  one category and hence give us a larger room than our competitors.      Rather than a major overhaul, I decided to focus on the message that the end-user receives with the shared  link on WhatsApp. Since there wasn’t much scope for changing the core text, I came up with a simple idea of  a ‘certified logo’, a ‘seal of authority’ which would be fixed on every product’s image on our site.   I quickly photoshopped several variations and did a quick survey, which included people from all categories,  office employees and their families and friends. As expected, it was unanimously agreed that the logo made  the link look more trustworthy and enticing.   This logo was introduced on a few of our products in March, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most  retailers have paused their operations with us, meaning the true impact of this change remains to be tested.  We are utilizing this time to work around the logo, doing in-house surveys regarding other changes that can  be made, doing the technical work required to introduce the logo on every product, etc.     Insight:    If I were to re-do this project, I would have started with the better understanding of ‘What is’, I would have  utilized ‘journey mapping’ quite early on the project, that would have allowed me to skip some steps, and I  would have also paid more heed to my gut instinct, thought of myself as a sample user. I could have done a  better job at documenting the process and by clearly defining deadlines and goals, this might have allowed  us to launch the project just in time.   What this project revealed to me is that Design Thinking is really nothing more than systematically revealing  the simplest nugget of truth which we all ignore in favor of our complex fabricated assumptions and  solutions.

