Convene is a premium venue company that offers meeting & event spaces, work suites, community workplaces, and private clubs with a focus on hospitality. With its in-house AV, virtual events platform, culinary, interior design, and hospitality teams, Convene offers a comprehensive and personalized experience for its clients.
Background
The Convene.com marketing site provided insight into the company, its story, and its people. In Q4 2021, the leadership, head of marketing, and product team recognized the need for a major overhaul of the website to prepare for future partnerships and investments.
Challenge
Several legacy issues and future initiatives propelled this project into action:
The site had become dated and a hodgepodge due to its multiple owners and agencies working on various sections and secondary support sites. Leadership wanted a more premium look to better reflect their quality and services.
Convene was in talks with a well-established company for funding and wanted to put their best face forward to land the deal.
Marketing needed an easier way to build out targeted marketing sites or “one-off” sites for targeted marketing and A/B testing.
The product team needed a better foundation for the future of eCommerce and a customer portal through the website.
The overall site needed a refresh and a holistic approach for a more integrated look.
Team
Due to sparse resources, I along with the Director of Product Design spearheaded the entire research and redesign in 3 months.
Myself (Senior Product Designer)
Jeff Badillo (Director of Product Design)
Dan Lehman (Product Manager)
Cypress North (Engineering Partners)
Process
To gather the necessary information for the overhaul, the Director of Product Design and I developed a research plan that included a current site audit, interviews, and workshops with key stakeholders and customers, competitive analysis, customer segmentation, requirements and restraints gathering, and mapping out user journeys and site maps. We also kept in consideration the future framework needs of the site to support eCommerce and the portal.
After presenting our research to leadership and marketing, we established clear goals and alignment across the business.
This project was broken into a multi-phased approach in which I collaboratively worked with the Director of Product Design. This was Phase 1.
Outcome
The redesign resulted in:
- At 3 months post-launch 31.28% increase to our inquiry form.
- At 6 months post-launch: 206% YOY increase in conversions (inquiry + closed won sales)
- 40% increase in Unique Sessions
- A $500 million investment + new partnership
- Marketing was now able to spin up custom pages using the modular component-based design system and conduct testing.
Convene.com
A screenshot of our Figjam research & planning board
Updated wireframe of Convene.com
Consolidated research findings into a deck to present to leadership
Brand Concept Work
Some of the earlier conceptual pieces were used when presenting to the CEO, leadership, and head of marketing. The design concepts not only helped us earn their trust, but also sparked excitement for the redesign and guided us toward a more elevated and softer look. These concepts served as the foundation for the redesign, which needed to align closely with Convene's established brand identity of dark grey and black.
The head of marketing asked me to create a photography guide to help guide our photographer after the CEO fell in love with the softer cream concepts
The Final Designs
The final designs struck a balance between Convene's original brand color of dark grey and the cream-colored concepts, resulting in a simplified yet lighter aesthetic.
Location page
One of the new initiatives for the .com site was an updated locations page. In the previous design, users had to click four levels deep to access the city and property they were interested in: Homepage -> Product Interest -> City -> Property -> Building page.
In the redesign, the Locations page is easily accessible from the main navigation menu and throughout the site as a content block. From this page, users can easily filter to find the city or property they are interested in without having to navigate through multiple pages. They can explore Convene's locations around the world on this page and view them on a map to find the location that best suits their needs.
In addition to being able to view the exact locations of Convene's properties, users can also filter by product offering to find locations that offer the specific products they are interested in. This was designed with scalability in mind, as the company added new properties.
Delivery File // Phase 1
The final delivery of phase 1 to our engineering partners below included: Site Map, Style Guide, Responsive Blocks (components) + Variations, Interactions, Final Responsive Page Layouts, Subpages, Reskinned Pages, New Contact forms, Comparison Modals, Marketing Modals, style guide, and Image Size Guide for our content partners.
Convene Membership eCommerce
Background
In addition to meeting & event space, and private work suite rentals, Convene offered individuals or small groups the opportunity to work from their many beautifully designed community spaces with free food and drink and access to Convene’s kitchen along with many other additional perks of being a member.
Challenge
Getting a Convene community membership was run via an extremely slow and antiquated process, it was only available for purchase through a sales associate via the general “Inquire” form. There was also a huge lack of information and prices. The option to self-serve was nonexistent and a huge blocker for many potential customers.
Team
Myself (leading this initiative)
Dan Lehman (Product Manager)
Process
This was phase 2 of the redesign, so I was able to analyze a lot of research done from phase 1 of the .com research. Where I saw gaps in knowledge or understanding, I held additional interviews, workshops, and useability with key stakeholders across the business. I worked closely with the other product designer who was focused on checkout to align where the user went from getting more information to when they felt ready to purchase. The final designs I delivered included:
• Updated hero with membership info + eCommerce
• New content block featuring the initial three types of memberships + eCommerce
• View All inclusion modal
• Book a tour block
• Adding an additional step in the checkout process for selecting/changing which type of membership they wanted
Outcome
Final outcome is yet to be seen and will be based on implementation decisions from leadership.
These two screens shows the beginning of eCommerce for memberships. User can select the membership that suites them, and start eh checkout journey.
Exploration of ways to house the dense information that needed to get lifted regarding the different types of memberships and their inclusions with the use of modals.
Building + Room Pages // Product Detail Page
Background
During the rapid redesign of the site, some pages only received a quick UI update. Phase 3 of the redesign focused on the Product Details Page, one of the most important and in-depth pages on the site. To begin this phase, I developed a research plan that included many of the same activities as the research conducted during the .com redesign, but with a narrowed focus on the Building and Room pages. This research included reviewing and synthesizing key points from previous research and interviews, conducting new focused interviews with key stakeholders, running workshops, conducting competitive and comparative analysis, user testing and validation, iterations, and final delivery.
Challenge
One of the main problems with the old site was the lack of information available to our users. Sales teams had to educate users about each property using multiple scattered sources, including information in Salesforce, marketing "One Sheets" PDFs, Google documents and sheets, photos, and other sources. This made their job difficult and the process slow, and the lack of unified information caused frustration internally and threatened the business by potentially losing potential new clients.
Process
After establishing a research plan and timeline, I audited the current site, conducted multiple stakeholder workshops, interviews, competitive comparative analysis, requirement & constraint gathering, mapped out user segments, conducted usability, iterated, analyzed all information, and worked closely with my partners in marketing and sales.
The main challenge was presenting a large amount of important information in a way that was easy for customers to digest and not overwhelming. Each property has its own unique data and facts, AND we offer various products such as meetings, events, workspace, and community membership within the property, each with its own unique information as well. It was my task to design a layout that was user-friendly, easy to understand, and would keep the customer engaged without getting lost. Below are the final designs for the updated Building pages.
Team
Myself (leading this initiative)
Dan Lehman (Product Manager)
Outcome
The project was well received by key stakeholders and approved and the delivery File had been sent to our partners at Cypress North. The continuation is dependent on leadership decisions.
Product Offerings: Expanded Accordion & Sticky Nav Behaviors
Each property has varying offers of the three core Convene products: Meetings & Events, WorkSuites, and Community Memberships. Because of this, the Three Product offerings are detailed in expandable accordions on each property details page. The decision to house additional information about the products in an accordion was to ensures that users are not overwhelmed with too much information on the page, and allows them to easily expand only the sections that they are interested in.
After useability testing, I discovered users would easily get lost when all of the accordions were opened. Although there isn’t a lot of cross-product interest for our users, there was enough feedback to find a better solution to help keep the user from feeling disoriented. Things to consider: main site navigation, building page sections, product accordion, and inquiry.
The solution was to create different navigation behaviors on scroll down, up, and when an accordion is expanded. This allows users to continue scrolling without losing their place on the page and easily navigate to other sections on the main building page or close the expanded accordion. To make it easier for users to inquire about a product, we added a sticky "Inquire" button footer, as the right rail inquiry form disappears when the page is scaled down.
First frame shows as user scrolls down, a sub sticky nav appears to allow users to easily navigate to different sections within the page. Second frame shows the main site nav disappears, and the sticky inquiry button appears. Third shows the expanded product accordion sticky appears. User now knows which section they are viewing and can close at any time, or navigate to entirely different section of the page.
Meetings & Events
The first product offering, Meeting & Events, includes general information (with a “See More” modal for even more detailed info), the Net Promoter Score (a key measure in the hospitality industry), and a list of the meeting and event rooms available at the location sortable by capacity. Each room card can be clicked on that pops open a room detail modal which houses more images and detailed information about the specific room.
One of the challenges I faced while designing this feature was the limited data available in Salesforce. To ensure that we could provide users with the information they need, I worked with teams responsible for Salesforce to prioritize unifying scattered data into the system and populate the pages.
WorkSuites
The WorkSuite offerings at Convene are presented differently in the layout because the images are not as visually appealing as the meeting and event rooms. These rooms are "blank slates" that customers can work with our internal interior designer to customize. Initially, we displayed the rooms in a similar way to the meeting and event rooms, but after user testing, we found that this approach was not effective for this particular product offering. Instead, we chose a "real estate" listing style, where users can see high-level room specifications and click to view the room if desired.
The room details are slightly more buried to meet the needs of the business, but we also wanted to make it easy for users to see the space if they are interested. Users can also sort the rooms by clicking on the headers to re-sort by Suite#, Floor, Sq ft., or Capacity.
Memberships
Memberships are the final offering of Convene, and the first offering that is ready for eCommerce. Similar to the other offerings, there are general facts and options to view the staff of the building and get in touch with the Convene sales team. However, this offering also includes the start of the purchase process for eCommerce.
Room Detail
The detailed room modal treatment was a significant departure from the original website design. When deciding to adopt this approach, I considered several key factors:
The previous experience was buried within the site, requiring users to keep hitting the back button to return to the building page to view the next room.
The Room detail page did not have much information, just a short paragraph, making it difficult for planners or customers to make an informed decision about the space.
There was only one photograph of the space.
To improve the user experience, I gathered more information from scattered resources across departments, including AV equipment, room setup options, and existing data in our Salesforce system. I also worked with the marketing team to provide enticement and vision for the space. I thoroughly researched and validated the product detail room pages, as they are crucial in closing deals with potential customers.
Similar pages were created for the WorkSuite (office space) product detail page, with the addition of information about our interior design service.
Image Gallery
The full image gallery for the specific building can be accessed by clicking on any photo in the hero image or the "View All Photos" button. We noticed that the hero image carousel was a popular feature on the original site, so decided to enhance the image gallery by allowing for a larger number of sortable images. To make it easier to find and view a specific category, I added filters at the top of the gallery which allows users to easily filter their view.
Map, Neighborhood & Commute Tool
Users wanted to know more about the neighborhood around the Convene location. Whether they were planning to host an event, visit Convene regularly for work, or become a member, they were interested in transportation options, nearby hotels, landmarks, restaurants and bars, and the distance from their home, office, or airports, trains, and buses. To help users make informed decisions, we added a commuting tool that allows them to view their potential commute to Convene. This updated section provides users with a comprehensive understanding of the area and its amenities, helping them make more informed decisions.
Modals
Below are modals that housed even more information to ensure the page didn’t get too long and overwhelming, but still allowed for more details if the user chooses to dive deeper.
Building & Room Page Delivery File // Phase 3
The screenshot below shows the delivery file for phase 2, which included a major overhaul and redesign for both the UX and UI of the product detail pages. These pages contain vital information about Convene's product offerings (meeting & events, WorkSuites, and memberships), as well as detailed information about the space. One measure of success for this phase was the lack of questions or confusion from our engineering partners during the handoff, as the file was well-prepared with clear notes, interactivity, and prototypes.
The Portal
Background
In order to ensure the sustainability of our e-commerce efforts, scale the business and empower our current members with their experience, we recognized the need to develop a self-management portal. This portal is the phase 4 of convene.com and represents a crucial component in our efforts to advance multiple initiatives concurrently.
Challenge
Customers/users needed a single admin portal that would allow them to:
• Manage billing
• Manage their account
• Manage members
• Book meetings
• Invite guests
• Order food
• Upsell products
• Engage in community events/networking
• Help/Support/feedback
While important for our end users to gain the power over their own account, we had to ensure that our internal teams and logistics could support this. This product had an ongoing and open dialogue with our internal teams on how this would affect their current workflow, and how we could also improve and make their jobs more efficient. Part of the problem solving was how we could best integrate tools and platforms already in use into the portal for a seamless experience. The hope was taking some of the burden off of their day to day, and empower the customers.
Team
Myself (Senior Product Designer)
Jeff Badillo (Head of Product)
Dan Lehman (Product Manager)
Process
Initial research and workshops were led by Jeff and myself. Similar to other research plans conducted we conducted interviews (internal & external), workshops, audit, understanding processes & dependencies of operations, establishing user segments, competitive comparative analysis, feature mapping, and establishing MVP vs Blue sky features. Due to competing priorities, I left the rest of the research and designs to my partner Jeff, the head of Product, who continued on.
Outcome
Final outcome is yet to be seen and will be based on implementation decisions from leadership.
Overview of the research boarrd
Defining User Segments and Roles
Convene's main offerings were Meetings & Events, WorkSuite, and Memberships, each with its own set of users. Defining our eCommerce strategy was complex, given uncertainties about what to offer. To ensure scalability, we planned for potential changes. I included internal and external users in the development process, carefully defining access needs for each role to optimize efficiency.
Portal Journey Map while flagging backend or logistical dependencies
Matrix of Portal needs and Persona needs
Portal Site Map & Designs
As I was pulled off to begin work on another project, my partner Jeff began taking the research and continue the work on the portal. Below are examples of site map and some key screens of the new portal.
Desktop examples of Sign up/Login screens, Billing, and Payment
Success Metrics
The Convene marketing and product teams were satisfied with the results and continued to closely monitor the website's performance to identify areas for improvement. We held regular meetings with our partners at Cypress North, who provided us with detailed metrics for the site and worked with the product manager and myself to plan and test further iterations.