StrideQ
Project
Transforming StrideQ's admin dashboard and developing a tool for menu management
StrideQ, a Y-Combinator-backed startup, provides a solution for restaurants to manage orders by phone, online, and in-person while automating missed call responses. The project focused on redesigning the admin portal to streamline sales monitoring and menu management for restaurant owners or admins, improving operational efficiency.
Duration
Sep 2022 - Aug 2022
Tools
Figma, Adobe Creative Suite, Procreate
Dream Team
Me!
Product Designer
Shreyansh Gandhi
CEO, PM, & Engineer
Sreehari P. Sivadasan
Engineer
Brenton Talbott
Marketing & Sales
Duration
The Problem
StrideQ was overwhelmed by support calls from new and existing customers, consuming over 50% of the founder's time. How might we reduce this to create sustainable solutions, enable growth, and minimize customer churn?
The Outcome
After developing a cohesive design system and launching new designs for the admin portal’s sales dashboard and menu management experience, support calls decreased by 70% and customer satisfaction increased by 86%.
Define
Business Goals & Constraints
Following a discussion with Shreyansh about the problem and gathering additional information, we defined the business goals and constraints that are essential to consider throughout the process.
💡 Business Goals
- Grow and scale as a company
- Reduce customer churn
- Create trustworthy solutions
⏰ Constraints
- Time
- Limited funding
- Limited internal resources
The Design Process
User Research
Conducting Interviews with 5 Long-Term Customers
Our target audience consisted of restaurant owners and admins aged 30 to 50 who are busy either because they manage multiple businesses, which prevents them from being fully hands-on, or because they have limited staff.
To understand the source of the support calls and their overall experience, I conducted interviews and contextual inquiries of five long-term StrideQ customers.
To understand the source of the support calls and their overall experience, I conducted interviews and contextual inquiries of five long-term StrideQ customers.
Juan, 45
📍 Mountain View, CA
💻 Restaurant Owner, PM
Juan, the owner of Chilo’s Taqueria, is a 45-year-old full-time product manager in tech. With a busy work and family life, he struggles to dedicate time to his restaurant.
To stay informed, Juan occasionally logs into StrideQ’s admin portal to review key metrics like revenue and sales. He also communicates regularly with the restaurant manager to ensure everything runs smoothly, relying on them to handle daily operations while he focuses on his primary job.
To stay informed, Juan occasionally logs into StrideQ’s admin portal to review key metrics like revenue and sales. He also communicates regularly with the restaurant manager to ensure everything runs smoothly, relying on them to handle daily operations while he focuses on his primary job.
Dhruv, 52
📍 San Jose, CA
💻 Restaurateur
Dhruv, a seasoned restaurateur, owns multiple Everest House locations and aims to expand from 3 to 7 while maintaining quality. Always on the move, he aims to ensure smooth operations by gathering customer feedback.
Focused on cost-effectiveness and growth, Dhruv uses StrideQ’s admin portal daily to track key metrics and its impact on his bottom line. By balancing efficiency with customer engagement, he ensures his restaurants thrive in a competitive market.
Focused on cost-effectiveness and growth, Dhruv uses StrideQ’s admin portal daily to track key metrics and its impact on his bottom line. By balancing efficiency with customer engagement, he ensures his restaurants thrive in a competitive market.
Kiran, 34
📍 Milpitas, CA
💻 Restaurant Manager
Kiran is the restaurant manager at Mr. Biryani, where he oversees all in-store operations amidst a busy schedule and limited staff. He primarily uses the POS system and Admin portal to manage menu changes and catering information, but he struggles with time constraints and the need to handle manual tasks.
His goal is to boost operational efficiency in order to enhance customer experience and train his team. He relies on StrideQ for its centralized access to information.
His goal is to boost operational efficiency in order to enhance customer experience and train his team. He relies on StrideQ for its centralized access to information.
Synthesis
User Research Key Findings & Insights
After synthesizing the findings, we identified that the main pain points came from the admin portal, which led to most support tickets. This insight helped us narrow our focus to the portal.
01
A disorganized dashboard experience
Customers had difficulty understanding important business analytics such as the bar graphs and other key metrics displayed in the dashboard.
02
An inefficient menu-management system
Admins found managing menu item visibility on to be time-consuming and labor-intensive, resulting in an inefficient experience.
03
A poor navigation experience
Navigating and locating user data is challenging because similar information is scattered across multiple pages, making it difficult for users to quickly access what they need.
Project Goal
How might we streamline the admin portal for efficient menu updates and redesign the dashboard for easier access to key insights?
Pain Point 01
A Disorganized Dashboard Experience
It is difficult for admins to understand and find important business metrics in the dashboard preventing customers from making informed decisions to improve their business. This is what the current solution looks like.
Define
Strategizing Feature Prioritization
I collaborated with Shreyansh to prioritize features based on user research, distinguishing between must-haves and nice-to-haves. This was a valuable learning experience in creating a balanced product roadmap that addresses both business and customer needs.
‼️ Must Haves
- Daily and weekly sales information (KPIs)
- Clear Data Visualization
- StrideQ impact data
- Mobile responsiveness
✓ Nice to Have
- Popular vs. Non-popular items
- Customizable layout (ex. sort feature, widgets)
- Customer review data
- Onboarding tooltips
User Research
Doordash Dashboard Analysis
Before proceeding with ideation, I revisited the research phase to conduct a competitive analysis of DoorDash, as many interview participants found its admin dashboard intuitive. I aimed to identify its strengths and weaknesses to inform improvements for StrideQ's dashboard.
Ideation
Starting with Low-Fi Sketches
During the ideation phase, I explored several different ideas focusing on layout, hierarchy, and data visualization. I also actively sought and received feedback from the team to refine these concepts further.
Exploration 01
Exploring visual grouping of information to help users easily scan and comprehend the analytics.
Exploration 02
Exploring hierarchy and different depictions of data such as line chart, table format, pie chart, etc
Exploration 03
Adding some “nice to have” features for a more delightful Dashboard experience
Feature Highlights
A Re-envisioned Dashboard Experience
Designed a dashboard with a clear hierarchy that highlights daily activity, total orders/revenue, StrideQ's impact, and key KPIs. It offers transparent, actionable insights to help build customer trust. Here are the highlights!
Final Dashboard Design & Prototype
Here is the final prototype for the new dashboard experience, and now fully mobile-responsive. After a final meeting with the engineers to review the design, we successfully launched the new design.
Pain Point 02
A Tedious Menu Management System
The second pain point was the time-consuming process of customizing menu item visibility through the admin portal. Users had to manually hide items not included in specific offerings that were available only during designated hours.
Define
Mapping Use Case Scenarios
I worked with Shreyansh to identify the key use cases our solution needed to accommodate. My goal was to develop a comprehensive approach that addresses as many scenarios as possible, ensuring the design adds value.
🔍 Use Cases
- Lunch Specials
- Different menu on different days of the week
- Discounts on items for a limited time
- Different menu for online vs. Dine-in
Ideation
Attributes of a Good Solution
With these use cases in mind, I began considering the key attributes that would contribute to an effective solution. Customers should have the ability to establish rules for menu item visibility, including the option to create an “override”.
🚦Rules
- When items show up on the menu
- Which items/categories this override applies to
Ideation
Exploring Low-Fi Design Flows
During ideation, I explored different patterns, layouts, and flows for the new feature. I gathered early feedback from stakeholders to validate whether the proposed user flow felt intuitive and logical for their needs.
Ideation 01
Exploring a pop-up modal, step-by-step flow for creating a visibility override. A card display format for easy access to details of created overrides.
Exploration 02
Consolidating creation in one place to reduce steps, while exploring a table display format for better sustainability with multiple overrides.
Final Solution
Introducing “Visibility Overrides”
Here’s the final prototype and design for the new visibility override feature. Due to its necessity and time constraints, we launched it quickly and made refinements based on post-launch feedback.
Results
Impact After Launch
After launching the new designs, we received great feedback from customers and successfully met our goal of reducing support calls.
70%
Decrease in support calls
Before the launch, StrideQ received over 10 calls daily during peak hours. After the launch, this number dropped to around 3 calls.
86%
Increase in customer satisfaction
Customer feedback calls showed that 26/30 restaurant admins found the new changes more efficient for decision-making and operations.
My Contribution to StrideQ
01
📚 Educated on Design
Introduced engineers to design thinking, fostering weekly discussions that helped the team understand the rationale behind design decisions.
02
👩🏽 Designed Marketing Material
Designed marketing materials, including landing pages, posters, and business cards, to boost brand visibility and awareness.
03
💻 Created a Design System
Developed a design system with Material UI to drive consistency across products and enhance efficiency as the company grows.
Visual Design
Creating a Design System
As mentioned earlier, I revamped our design system to make it more comprehensive and robust, using Material UI to ensure visual consistency and efficiency as the company scales.
Reflection
Takeaways
Working at StrideQ was a rewarding experience that pushed me to grow and adapt as designer. Here are my key learnings, challenges, and next steps:
01
How to Collaborate with Engineers
Discussions emphasized the need to make tradeoffs while considering company constraints.
02
Working in a Fast-Paced Startup
Despite limited structure and mentorship, I took the initiative to educate the team on customer-focused design.
03
Adding Accessibility
Improve accessibility by ensuring proper focus order and color contrast meets AA WCAG guidelines for future designs.
03
Gathering Data and Testing
Next steps involve gathering data over time, developing solution variants, and conducting A/B testing to refine these solutions.
Want to see more?
Checkout some of my other projects!
