SR*
The Challenge.
Small businesses in emerging markets face significant challenges in establishing an online presence due to technical barriers, high setup costs, and a lack of digital expertise. Amazon SmartBiz aimed to address this gap by providing a no-code, AI-assisted website builder. However, the existing experience was complex, leading to low adoption rates and high drop-offs during the setup process.
The goal was to simplify the store creation journey and increase conversion rates by reducing friction, guiding users through AI-powered automation, and optimizing the onboarding flow. Our objective was clear: help small business owners get online faster, with minimal effort, and scale their digital presence seamlessly.
Skills
User Research, Task Flows, Prototyping, Usability Testing, Interaction Design
My Role.
As the Lead Product Designer, I defined the UX strategy, led user research, and designed an intuitive cross-platform experience across web, mobile, and desktop. Partnering with product managers and engineers, I focused on simplifying the store setup journey and driving user adoption.
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Key Contributions
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User Research & Insights : Conducted user interviews and usability tests to uncover key pain points in website creation.
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AI-Driven Onboarding : Designed an AI-powered onboarding flow that dynamically generated store layouts based on business type, reducing setup time.
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No-Code Customisation : Created a modular, drag-and-drop editor, enabling effortless store customization without technical expertise.
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Conversion Optimisation : Worked with cross-functional teams to streamline the conversion funnel, improving activation rates and retention.
Key Metrics.
ADOPTION RATE
SETUP TIME REDUCTION
CONVERSION RATE
30%
Improvement in storefront completion rate, optimizing the journey from signup to store launch.
+25%
Increase in activation rates, driven by an intuitive, no-code editor and guided flows.
20%
Faster store setup with AI-powered onboarding, helping sellers go live quickly.
HIGHLIGHTS
Design Your Store, Your Way – No Code Needed!
The website builder offers a library of AI-powered, fully customizable templates tailored for different industries. Sellers can easily tweak layouts, colors, and branding with drag-and-drop simplicity, ensuring a professional, high-converting store—without any design skills. 🚀
Research & Information Gathering.
To ensure the website builder effectively met the needs of small businesses, I conducted in-depth user research, interviewing [X] merchants across industries such as F&B, fashion, jewelry, shoes, retail, and electronics. The research focused on understanding their challenges in setting up an online store, their level of technical expertise, and the specific features they needed.​
We spoke to 30+ sellers to understand their current experience & perspective with running a business
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Research Plan : A detailed research plan was aligned with stakeholders and Product Managers, ensuring they had equal access to user feedback and interviews as the design team.
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Research Method : The research was done as a combination of immersive site visits, remote interviews as well as surveys.
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Digital Literacy : More than 70% of our users were fairly fluent in digital proficiency.
PLATFORM
SHOPIFY
% OF SELLERS
Here are some of the insights uncovered during the conversations with the sellers :
"I picked a template that looked great in the demo, but now I want to make small changes—like moving the ‘Buy Now’ button or tweaking my homepage layout. Turns out, I need to hire a developer just to do that."
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Most website builders offer limited customisation unless sellers know how to code
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Editing a theme often requires Liquid templates or paid third-party themes
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Even simple UI adjustments, like repositioning elements, need developer assistance
"Shopify gives me traffic reports, but I don’t know what to do with the data. For eg, If my bounce rate is high, what does that mean? If my most-viewed product isn't selling, how do I fix it?"
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Sellers receive generic analytics but lack actionable insights on how to improve sales
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Google Analytics integration is available but not intuitive for non-technical users
"I sell across multiple platforms—my own website, Instagram, and WhatsApp. If I change the price or stock of an item, I have to update it manually everywhere. It’s exhausting, and sometimes I miss an update, leading to customer complaints when they buy something that’s out of stock."
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Website builders lack real-time inventory sync across multiple sales channels
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Sellers manually update stock and prices, leading to errors, overselling, or stockouts
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Shopify & Amazon offer integrations, but they often require expensive third-party apps
"I wanted to set up a ‘Buy 2 Get 1 Free’ offer, but the discount rules were so confusing. I had to Google multiple workarounds, and in the end, I still wasn’t sure if I did it right"
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They don’t know if a discount will actually increase revenue or just cut into profits.
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Shopify and WooCommerce offer complicated discount rule setups that lead to errors, like stacking discounts unintentionally.
SALE
Research & Information Gathering.
Empowering Sellers with a Seamless Mobile-First Experience
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Edit on the Go : A mobile-first store editor that enables sellers to easily manage and make real-time changes to their online stores, wherever they are.
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Seller Education : Integrated educational tools and step-by-step guidance designed to help sellers confidently navigate the platform, boosting self-sufficiency and store success.
AI-Driven Cataloging for Effortless Product Management
Leveraging AI, the cataloging system automatically classifies products and tags them with relevant keywords, making it faster and more accurate to organize and manage inventory. This intelligent system not only saves time but also enhances product discoverability for sellers, allowing sellers to quickly locate products and streamline their operations with minimal effort.​
I have additional visuals and examples that I’d be happy to walk you through and discuss further during a call.​
Key Learnings.
1. Website Builder Integration:
One of the key takeaways was realizing that a website builder must integrate seamlessly into the seller’s daily workflows, rather than being a standalone tool, this also meant factoring in the primary used device ie Mobile
3. Actionable Insights Over Data
We discovered that sellers don’t need more data; they need clear, actionable insights to drive their decisions and optimize their sales.
2. Real Time Inventory Sync
A crucial learning was that real-time inventory sync isn’t just a nice feature—it’s essential for building customer trust and maintaining a smooth user experience.
4. Conversational Commerce as a Primary Channel
One of the biggest learnings was understanding that conversational commerce, through platforms like WhatsApp and Instagram, is not just an add-on but a core sales channel for many sellers.
Since a lot of the information is confidential, I would be happy to walk you through the other solutions via a call