Developing a Dynamic Account Dashboard
Client: Driveway
Background: Driveway.com is a web-based solution for car buying and selling. The entire transaction is done online with no need to go to a dealership.
Challenge: Enhance and personalize the post-login experience by creating an account dashboard that tailors messaging and resources to the stage of the user’s journey.
Solution: This project ultimately entailed designing screens for more than ten different user states. Each state’s screen included a primary message and CTA, a carousel of one to three secondary CTAs/FAQs, and links to one to four existing knowledge base articles.
Roles: As a UX writer, I have more to contribute than just copy. I worked hand-in-hand with my product design counterpart and team lead to determine the various “states” to be designed for and the type of messaging that was appropriate for each, offering constant UI/UX input along the way. I led conversations surrounding nomenclature (including dubbing the landing page “Dashboard” and spearheading a nav redesign), partnering with User Research to make recommendations that were informed by customer feedback. I audited the existing articles in the “Guides & Tips” knowledge base to identify which ones might be most valuable for each state; led workshops to determine which ones should be surfaced and in what order.
See the content and designs for all 14 states here.
Improving Navigation
Creating this new landing page also meant adding to the account nav. This led to discussions around nomenclature. While others were curious about calling the landing page “My Driveway,” I pointed out that, per the User Research team’s findings, this was confusing for the user. Further, I noticed that internally, folks were using “My Driveway” to refer to both the landing page and the overall user account space. My suggestion was that “My Driveway” made sense as the name for the entire post-login ecosystem and we should name the landing page something else.
While suggesting alternatives, I also observed that “Home” was problematic, because it could easily be confused with the overall website’s homepage. I landed on “Dashboard” because it avoids the observed issues and has the bonus of being car-themed.
Since we were getting under the hood with the nav, I took the opportunity to rename a few of the detail pages and reorganize the running order in the layout into a more user-friendly list. I fought hard to avoid putting “My” in front of each page name. That redundancy is an eyesore and also confusing to read in a list.