Haier’s Digital Ecosystem
admin
- December 2, 2016
mediaman created Haier’s digital ecosystem strategy as a guideline for the company’s future activities. The map defines innovation-based activities around a centralized structure, putting the user in the centre of everything, and connecting his needs with scenarios, intelligent services and products. This principle will be implemented on Haier’s flagship portal haier.com, which mediaman will re-launch later this year.
The Chinese household appliance industry has realized the importance of digital early, and companies are constantly adapting their digital solutions. Haier has recognized, that innovation based thinking should also be carried out on their digital strategy.
As a leading company in digital strategy and interactive design, mediaman has been working actively with Haier in the past. In the light of innovative digital thinking, mediaman delivered an overall user-scenario touch point plan, which “expands their platform to wherever users go”.
The meaning of scenario-based experiences
A scenario is a story about users, to carry out a specific task or goal. In the stages of interactive design and requirement analysis, mediaman used the concept of time and place to illustrate different scenarios. For instance: “At a certain time (when) and place (where), something appears around the user (what) that triggers specific users (who) to have a wish (desire) – and they will think about how to satisfy that desire (method)”.
To describe Haier’s complex user scenarios, we used storyboards – a visualized script, with the combination of pictures and text, to show a complete task or an interactive action. User scenarios applied throughout the whole process of the product design, to simulate realistic user behavior and interactive actions, which also applied in the usability evaluation of Haier’s products.
mediaman mapped out all the steps that a user will take to complete a task, with a focus on what a user will do in different scenarios. A character represented a typical user that could connect to several storyboards. The aim of describing a character was to ensure we include all user requirements.
At the center of everything: the user
Most appliance enterprises platforms plan user requirements and functionalities in a traditional approach. The websites focus is on products, services, sales, interactions and specific functions. But user behaviors are changing with the continuous evolvement of the mobile internet, and must be considered in a digital strategy.
In the desktop era, users would access the internet at a relatively fixed place and time. Nowadays, users can access the internet wherever and whenever on their mobile devices. That revolution directly influences our client’s product strategy, which is a big challenge. The product design in the mobile internet era now considers three factors synthetically: time, place and character. Time and place are product design factors that differ mobile from desktop internet. Both factors directly relate to the success or failure of a product. mediaman carefully considered all factors in Haiers digital ecosystem strategy.
Digital strategies need to build the right connection with users at the right time. Through different scenario touch-points the product demands, interaction requirements and marketing information are adapted to users. Haier’s digital ecosystem strategy was developed with an overall user scenario touch-point plan. mediaman changed the existing traditional concept and approach, to generate more creativity and innovation – putting the user in the centre of everything and connecting his needs with scenarios, intelligent services and products.