Migros Market Visit
My Roles
Workshop Lead, User Experience Lead, Visual Design Lead
Design Team Size
3
Date
March 2016
Industry
Consumer Products
THE CHALLENGE
Retail promotions at Migros, Switzerland Lacked consistency and quality
Migros, the largest retail company in Switzerland and the country's leading supermarket chain, collaborated with the Apple+IBM MobileFirst for iOS initiative to develop an app tailored for their trade marketing associates. These associates served as brand representatives for products in Migros stores, engaging in tasks such as product understanding, market research, in-store promotion, sampling, taste testing, and collecting event feedback on behalf of the sponsoring brand.
The Trade Marketing Intelligence unit was established to enhance the visibility of everyday goods like cookies, soaps, and dairy items across Migros supermarkets and beyond. This unit relied on back-office personnel to oversee promoters responsible for tasks ranging from setting up displays, acquiring product knowledge, and interacting with customers to gauging brand satisfaction.
With increasing popularity among supermarket shoppers, the promotion team expanded significantly, comprising hundreds of promoters and eight field managers. However, the reliance on antiquated manual processes persisted among back-office staff. This included the use of phone calls, email, texts, and personal emails for promoter scheduling and workflow management. As expansion continued, the outdated analog approach led to confusion and disarray, impacting both back-office operations and promoters. The lack of standardized manual processes undermined the quality of retail promotions and hindered effective scaling.
DISCOVERY
The reliance on paper and personal communication methods resulted in significant system breakdowns and ultimately contributed to subpar quality in product promotions.
Training is slow due to the need to email individual documents out to each of the promoters individually.
Verifying that the booth was setup correctly requires emailing or texting a picture to a supervisor and waiting for a response.
Processes like reordering goods used at the store and paying for the goods used in the promotion is done on paper, opening the door for errors and mistakes.
Scaling the promotion operation was difficult due to all the outdated ways of running this part of the business.
THE VISION
An app that consolidates all activities performed by the trade marketing rep into one simple experience.
We designed the Market Visit App to be used by trade marketing reps in a way that took them through the three stages of a promotion: preparation, active promotion, and reporting. The app's data was organized by date, showing the reps where they were in the process for each of the promotions they were assigned to.
By eliminating all emailing of training materials and incorporating training materials and quizzes into the app, we can reduce confusion and inefficiencies in the learning process.
During promotions the rep can keep track of their time on job, expenses, products used to be reimbursed or paid for and any notes or feedback. The company can verify that booths are setup correctly all in the app.
THE DESIGN
Training, preparation, promoting and reporting all in one new experience.
Distinct states for each phase of the promotion.
To effectively isolate the specific business logic and UI presentation of each one of the states of the promotion, the app uses the states of the promotion to indicate to the trade marketing rep the types of activities will be under each one of the cards on the main screen.
Let’s prep for the product promotion.
The preparation state enables the trade marketing rep to go through required training that is necessary to complete so that they have the knowledge they need to give the best customer experience while they are in the active promotion phase of a product.
Completing the preparation ends with a quiz to demonstrate their proficiency in understanding the product details and promotion activities they will have to carry out while on site in the store. Once the quiz is complete, the trade marketing rep is ready to begin the promotion.
It’s time to go to the store, setup and promote your first product.
In the promotion state, the trade marketing rep is actively working the promotion for the week and this view is what drives all their activities as well as allowing them to document their time worked and breaks, recording notes, viewing tips, and paying for and ordering more product for the store.
Starting the day
The rep can start the day by tapping on the day they are working in the top header of the promotion detail page. A full screen modal comes to isolate the rep into the tasks that they need to complete for the day. Once they tap “Start Day” in the navigation bar, the app starts to record the time on the job. The rep can also record breaks they take directly from this screen.
Verifying the product setup
This modal shows the flow for submitting photos of the booth for approval by corporate.
On the right image, you can see the approval state once corporate approves it on the backend.
So, your’e done with the promotion week, let’s start reporting.
Once the week is completed, the card turns into the reporting phase of the promotion. In this phase, the trade marketing rep is able to close out the week reporting on how the promotion went and reporting their expenses for the week.
RESULTS
Improved product promotions, happy customers and increased sales.
By harnessing the capabilities of the iPad, we streamlined their existing analog processes and created an app that revolutionized their workflow. As a result, promoters were not only better informed and more skilled but also experienced higher job satisfaction. This enhancement in their work process ultimately led to an improved quality of promotions performed by the trade marketing rep.
“Our collaboration with Apple and IBM is reinventing how we do business. By creating a compelling, mobile-first process for our field employees, we are transforming how they work and it’s game-changing for not only employees but for our business and our customers,” said Lukas Bigler, Project Manager Head of TMI. “Our employees who work remotely in various stores require the most current product information to do their job well. We are now putting relevant information at the fingertips of our mobile employees, making it easier for them to do their daily job, be more productive and augment the quality of the promotions.”
