Promoting small Japanese brands to global audiences.
Role:
I worked as the UI designer and collaborated with Horizon technology for front-end development.
Tools:
Figma, Hotjar, Google Analytics
Method:
Wireframing, Mockups
Neokyo is continually exploring fresh Japanese brands and marketplaces for potential partnerships. Whenever a novel ally is discovered, it becomes necessary to fashion a unique store page for them.
Due to the diverse designers and design concepts engaged over time, users patronizing multiple marketplaces experience inconsistent interface.
I was tasked with creating a versatile template to be employed uniformly on all brands and marketplaces. The first brand to utilize this template would be CSLotus, a trading card website based in Fukuoka.
Every shop showcases a unique facet. Magi boasts a vast collection of trading cards and sets, offering numerous choices. Minne is a comprehensive source for handcrafted items, where customers can discover anything from stylish clothes to bespoke furniture.
Rakuma and Mercari are colossal retail spaces with goods in the thousands.
The challenge was to design a template adaptable to any storefront, ensuring aesthetic uniformity regardless of the extra elements.
We wanted to avoid a one-marketplace focus, aiming to stimulate users to explore other shops, and thus, links leading to different stores needed introduction.
Sketching & Ideating
Once the plan was detailed, I transitioned to drafting and jotting concepts for page components.
At this juncture, the quantity of content blocks for sections like “Neokyo Steps” components like the fee breakdown were under evaluation and trial. This phase was utilized to get ready for wireframing and to discuss my thought-out ideas with key team figures (such as the frontend developer) to comprehend the optimal strategy for Neokyo.
During this project's timeline, Neokyo was yet operating on JQuery 3.5 and had tight restrictions on UI elements.
In this phase of the project, I primarily concentrated on reorganizing the current page content and integrating new features. After finishing the initial low-fidelity prototype, I presented it to the primary decision-makers and customer support staff to identify potential enhancements. This led to suggestions for incorporating a table comparing services and a catalog of forbidden items. With this input, I proceeded to design the high-fidelity mockups.
Expansion
Following the inception of CSLotus, we fine-tuned the template to be compatible with our successive venture, Neokyo Select. Neokyo Select emerges as a digital temporary store, spotlighting distinct Japanese brands for time-bound periods.
The shop's focus lies more on a confined array of products, not categories, hence we modified the template to display the products akin to a conventional e-commerce storefront.
The revised template simplifies the inclusion or exclusion of elements, all the while maintaining a consistent aesthetic appeal. This keeps the user interface recognizable and effortless to comprehend.
