Sardius Control Panel is the main admin panel of the company for online live events and media platforms. The platform allows users to manage their events, create unique experiences, and host, manage and stream content.
We're redesigning Sardius's Control Panel to improve the user interface and experience when users interact with the team have been operating with a design version that is complicated to use for Sardius' clients and even internally for members of the team.
The Control Panel was built without following any UX process because, in the beginning, there was no product designer on the team.
Many features were added to the Control Panel on the go. As a result, the system began to grow but became very complex with a terrible user experience.
We plan the work in a way that addressed the main pain points but at the same time aligned with the business goals of making minor improvements for the clients to experience it.
We analyzed the existing experience and conducted user research by having in-depth interviews with users, made a heuristic evaluation to identify usability issues, analyzed the competitors to identify the areas of opportunity and value proposition, and gathered all this information to start prioritizing and planning the product roadmap based on different factors like user desires, business value and work effort.
We broke the project down into a few essential chunks of work to ensure we're making a small but important process. We started with exploring solutions to improve the main sections that included the most important tasks of the platform.
All solutions were tested by conducting usability testing with at least 5 users. Then, we would review the results and iterate the design based on the finding.
There were three clear bits of work we extensively worked on:
- Sites: Designed and prototype the most important section and improved the flow of creating a site.
- Calendar: Design and prototype their event calendar with all their functionalities.
- Experience Settings: Design and prototype the section where users can customize the look and feel and add content for their event or video web page.
- Tickets & Coupons: Design and prototype the section where users can create event tickets and coupon codes.
In general, we also worked on improving the information architecture of the platform, which impacted the platform's overall design.
Redesigning a huge product was challenging, but other factors made it even harder.
We had a limited capacity for the amount of work. There was only 1 product designer (me) and 2 front-end developers on the team for the redesign project. Even tho we made a lot of improvements on the product, the product roadmap could have been faster if we had more people working on the project.
We also had some technical constraints because of how the code was built long ago. Changing all that would take so much time and effort for developers, which we needed more time and capacity for.
After a few iterations and releases, we got to a well-performing baseline. We were in a good place where the core tasks flows were improved, and the information architecture ensured scalability for new features.
This challenging project was about building a design system from scratch, establishing and implementing a solid UX process, and working on the main frustrations that clients were experiencing.
We set the foundations for the team to take further and continue iterating or adding new features.
The changes were implemented in the code were all clients could benefit from the enhancements. This made the product more solid and robust, and easier to use.
We improved the product so that all technical or non-technical users can use it without extra support from the Sardius team.
Even if we want that, we have a limited time on earth. Talk with users, analyze the data and prioritize the enhancements and features to work on the most urgent things first.
Think also about your audience experience. Don't create extensive reports that nobody will read. It just won't help you or the team.
Things will be likely to change over time. Reviewing our plan, goals, and metrics will help the team ensure we are on the right track and not just following a random schedule.
