Digital Transformation

I transformed a web analytics reporting program at ConocoPhillips. Through years of work designed a measurement framework, a reporting workflow and a dashboard template for digital communications.

Case Study & Showcase

An analytics dashboard changed minds about digital

Project Keywords
  • Web Analytics
  • Iterative Design
  • Communication
  • Enterprise Software
  • Global Oil & Gas company
Timeline

Sept. 2014 - Dec. 2019

Scope

End-to-end product design

My Role

Intrapreneur

My Role
practicing UX Designer

I applied my UX Design expertise while working for ConocoPhillips as Digital Communication Specialist. I observed gaps in digital strategy and how platform decisions were being handled. I reviewed the website and discovered we were not using analytics at all.

I started an initiative to fix that by evolving our digital communications team as part of an ongoing digital transformation at the company.

My work included designing a reporting workflow and report template, creating a measurement framework, KPIs and tracking, global analytics training, user discovery and dashboard design.

Collaborators
  • Product Owner(s)
  • IT Specialist
  • Data Specialist
  • Functional Leadership
Skills
  • Dashboard Interface & Interaction Design
  • User Experience Designer
  • Personas
  • Power BI
  • Metrics & Measurement framework
  • Google Data Studio
  • Google Analytics

Background

In 2014 oil and gas prices were at a record highs, and the company had just undergone a major split off from the downstream side of the business, the new company was looking for innovative ways to set itself apart from the old company and go in its own direction.

Digital measurement and analytics  was not present in the digital communications program. Dedicated digital communications resources were a very new function at ConocoPhillips. Functional leadership was skeptical about how leadership would use it and there were no resources to support it. I taught the company about analytics and what this new function could bring to the business. 

Approach

UX Design Approach - Double Diamond

Discovery

Define goals and actions by researching and understanding user needs. Uncover the real user problems. Research, interviews,

Define

Narrow down goals and actions by pinpointing specific user challenges. Goal: Clearly articulate the problem. Action: Create user personas, identify pain points

Design

Clearly articulate the problem. Create user personas, identify pain points

Deliver

Converge on a viable solution. Action: Prototyping, testing, refining – turn those sketches into something users can interact with

Project timeline

Define

Problem

After discovering we had a Google Analytics account on the current site,  I spoke with my manager to understand why reporting and analytics was had been abandoned.

Articulating Findings

Starting with existing management I conducted interviews and conversations to learn about the past analytics reporting experience. I learned the following about pain points.

  • Google Analytics implementation errors
  • Limited beliefs about digital communication
  • Execution knowledge and skill gaps
  • No clear value or plan
Outcomes
Functional Manager

Teach me what success looks like - not able to provide that clear language of web tech. No one on the team to do reporting, analytics or tracking - what is the workflow and requirements. 2 teams share responsibility - (balance between IT and communications) who does what

Executive Leadership

Didn't have a report in their language - wanted a high level report that spelled out performance takeaways and advise in very plain succinct langauge. Why do we invest in that web and digital communications could bring to the orgainaztion.

Operation teams

Design guys/communications specialists, functional workers who already have a full plate, learning curve and no one has the skillset to tack on analytics. What projects take on to have most effect on website performance.

Design

Problem

The lowest hanging fruit was cleaning up the Google Analytics implementation. So after I partnered with IT to get that fixed moved to tackle the elephant in the room. Getting stakeholder buy-in by changing minds about analytics.  What could I deliver and how could I define success?

Building the proof of concept

I leaned into the ambiguity around digital strategy and the low confidence in analytics. As the web and digital subject matter expert on the team I used this as my chance to show rather than tell what my idea could do.


Picking the MVP

Most recently our team had completed a $2 million corporate website redesign, so I focused the MVP product on reporting improvements and aligning on performance benchmarks.

Hand-made analysis and reporting

The first version of the report took 2 days to build. I used excel and powerpoint to manually pull data and build pivot charts.

Annual Iterative improvements

Ever year we iteratively adjusted the template design and goals.

Quarterly analytics report

I went through 3 iterations of template design in response to feedback.

COP_Analytics Report1_v1

Version 1

The first report was 16-pages and required 2 full working days to build by hand. The goal was to present big color coded data visuals so that insights were less intimidating for busy executive leaders.


 
COP_Analytics Report3_v1

Version 1

The first report was 16-pages and required 2 full working days to build by hand. The goal was to present big color coded data visuals so that insights were less intimidating for busy executive leaders.


 

Version 2 

In the redesign report template I used a data hub (NextAnalytics) to reduce build time by 4 hours. We added improved user data to watch for mobile growth.


 

Version 2 

Another feature of the redesign was 


 

Version 3 - simplified the report to 3 key slides. Focused on benchmarking performance of sections month over month. This was the predecessor to the dashboard.


 
Outcomes

I built our first reliable analytics service at the company. Recognized as the analytics SME I started monthly global analytics calls and headed a special projects team. I designed a reporting workflow and the reporting template. 

Design

Problem

the MVP report was a success, leadership wanted to expand the analytics reporting as a new service. The problem  they wanted me to design a scalable program that didn’t cost any extra.  I needed to build new features while also managing expectations. 

Scaling the product

Some of the key features in the backlog

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Develop a measurement framework & tracking plan

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Flexible reporting platform

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Improve user experience

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Analytics Dashboard

Affecting changes in approach

Before

Value of digital communication channels,  unmeasured  

No digital communication strategy

Attitude – Low tech savyness

No investment in support team & resources undefined

Outcomes

User Personas

I wrote personas for the different collaborators and audiences for analytics reporting.

Competitive Analysis

I did competitive analysis to create business requirements and performance benchmarks for our properties.

Technical Audit

I did an audit of Google Analytics tracking setup and I collaborated with IT to land on technical requirments.

Data Audit

I reviewed past reporting results in order to design metrics, KPIs and goals.

Analytics Dashboards

I wrote personas for the different collaborators and audiences for analytics reporting.

Analytics FTE

I did competitive analysis to create business requirements and performance benchmarks for our properties.

Award winning Projects

I did an audit of Google Analytics tracking setup and I collaborated with IT to land on technical requirments.

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Copyright © 2023 Rodney Echols | Experience Designer