Koala PDP Redesign

Discovery phase

Understanding how customers explore and compare sofa options

To understand how customers explored and evaluated the Cushy Sofa Bed, I analysed five screen-recorded sessions in Contentsquare. This helped me identify common behaviours, decision-making patterns, and where users spent (or skipped) attention on the product page.

Key user behaviour insights

Customers compare before committing

Compare the Cushy Sofa Bed against other Koala sofas at the category level, signalling a strong need for clear differentiation once they landed on the product page.

Imagery drives purchase confidence

All users relied heavily on product images, while written details and reviews played a secondary role, highlighting visuals as the primary decision-making tool.

Surface-level scanning over deep reading

Most users skimmed product information and USPs rather than reading in depth, suggesting key value points needed to be instantly visible and easy to grasp.

Learning from how other furniture brands present premium options

To understand how premium fabrics are commonly presented in ecommerce, I reviewed product pages from comparable furniture brands. The goal was to identify established patterns that help customers compare materials, understand value, and feel confident paying more.

Key competitor insights

Clear separation improves comparison

Successful product pages made fabric choices explicit, either by separating fabric and colour selection or clearly combining them, helping customers understand what they were comparing.

Visual feedback builds confidence

Dynamically updating imagery based on fabric selection was critical in helping customers see and trust the material difference, especially for premium options.

Transparency justifies price uplift

Premium fabrics were supported with clear material details, care information, and visible price differences, setting expectations and reinforcing value.

Mapping the end-to-end customer journey

To bring the insights together, I created a user journey map to understand customers’ motivations, emotions, and touchpoints throughout the Cushy Sofa Bed purchasing journey.

This helped me:
• Identify emotional highs and lows, along with key goals and jobs-to-be-done at each stage
• Surface opportunities for improvement, particularly around comparison and confidence-building
• Ground design decisions in real user needs, ensuring the experience supported customers at the moments that mattered most

Define phase

Building on the behavioural insights, competitor patterns, and journey mapping from Discovery

I moved into the Define phase by facilitating a cross-functional workshop in week two to align on the right product direction.

Together, we:
• Aligned on a long-term goal, grounded in the customer needs uncovered during discovery
• Framed key “How might we” questions to focus ideation around comparison, confidence, and premium value
• Generated and explored concepts using the Crazy 8s method to quickly test different approaches

Setting a clear long-term direction

To anchor the workshop and ensure alignment, we started by defining a long-term goal and the key questions we needed to answer to design a successful product detail page.
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• Defined a two-year vision for Koala to become the go-to brand for customisable, premium sofas
• Formulated key questions centred on customer needs, confidence, and comparison when choosing materials
• Used these questions to guide ideation, shaping the structure and focus of the workshop activities

This gave the team a shared direction and ensured all concepts explored were working toward the same outcome.

Defining the right problems to solve

To move from insight to action, we reframed our long-term goal and key questions into a set of clear How Might We problem statements. This helped the team align on what we needed to solve before jumping into solutions.

The HMWs:
• Focused the team on real customer needs around comparison, clarity, and value
• Opened up multiple solution paths while keeping us aligned to the same objective
• Set clear boundaries for ideation, ensuring concepts supported both user confidence and premium consideration

Synthesising opportunities into design principles

Following the workshop, I synthesised the How Might We statements into three clear design principles to guide the product strategy and experience design. These principles grounded subsequent ideation and ensured concepts stayed focused on customer confidence and premium consideration.

Simplify decision-making

Create intuitive ways for customers to easily differentiate between fabric options and features.

Highlight premium value

Use clear messaging, visuals, and interactions to communicate the benefits of the premium fabric and justify the price difference.

Enhance visual exploration

Provide high-quality imagery and fabric close-ups so customers can confidently visualise materials and finishes.

Rapidly exploring solution space

We closed the workshop by rapidly generating and evaluating concepts using a Crazy 8s exercise. This allowed the team to explore a wide range of solutions before converging on the strongest directions.

The concepts focused on:
• Clearer presentation of fabric options to support comparison
• Stronger communication of premium fabric benefits to justify the price uplift
• Enhancements to the product form that improved clarity without adding complexity

The highest-voted ideas informed the design direction taken into the next phase.

Design phase

With clear design principles in place, I moved into high-fidelity design to quickly validate ideas with customers that same week.

• Built on the existing Cushy Sofa Bed product page to reduce scope and isolate key changes
• Designed three distinct variations across desktop and mobile to explore different approaches to fabric selection and comparison
• Created a high-fidelity prototype using Koala’s design system and existing components to ensure realism in testing

Validating designs through iterative user feedback

To ensure the designs supported confident decision-making, I validated the designs with participants who closely matched Koala’s target audience.
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Across three rounds of unmoderated testing (22 participants total), I focused on:
• How easily users could discover and select the premium fabric option
• Clarity of material details and care information
• Whether the experience justified the higher price point and built purchase confidence

Rather than testing isolated variations, I shared and refined the design iteratively across multiple rounds of feedback. Each round informed targeted improvements, allowing the design to progressively reduce friction, clarify value, and better support higher-consideration purchasing decisions.

22 unmoderated usability tests across three rounds (6–8 users per round)

Objective 1: Improving discoverability of fabric options

The first objective was to validate whether customers could easily discover and understand the available fabric options when browsing the product form.

I focused on whether users could:
• Distinguish between the two available materials
• Understand which colours were available for each fabric
• Identify the price difference between standard and premium options

Objective 1 design iterations

Final iteration for the material selector in the product details form

Outcomes
• Over 70% of users noticed the material selector and supporting text link while browsing
• Users correctly identified that two fabric options were available
• Users understood colour availability per fabric
• Users clearly recognised the price difference when switching between options

Objective 2: Helping customers compare fabric options with confidence

I tested the “What’s the difference?” modal to assess whether it clearly communicated the value of each fabric and supported confident decision-making.

Objective 2 design iterations

Final iteration of the "What's the difference?" modal

Outcomes
• 72% of users opened the modal and could clearly articulate the differences between fabrics
• Users valued the side-by-side comparison table, finding it quick and easy to scan
• Customers understood the tactile differences between standard and premium fabrics
• Sustainability benefits of the premium fabric were clearly recognised

Objective 3: Building confidence through visual detail

I tested the “Take a closer look” modal to understand whether fabric close-ups and supporting information increased confidence in choosing the premium option.

Objective 3 design iterations

Final iteration of the "Take a closer look" modal

Outcomes
• 68% of users opened the modal and viewed close-up fabric imagery
• Users appreciated seeing the texture and weave detail up close
• Fabric information and care instructions were seen as helpful and reassuring
• A mismatch between fabric close-up colour and product imagery was identified, highlighting an opportunity to improve visual consistency

Synthesising insights and aligning on next steps

Following usability testing, I presented the findings to engineering and key stakeholders to align on what we learned, identify risks, and agree on clear recommendations before moving forward.

Insight 1

Price and choice still dominate decisions

64% of users preferred the standard polyester, driven by its lower price, wider colour range, and no perceived comfort trade-off.

Insight 2

The premium value proposition wasn’t clear

Users questioned why the bouclé fabric was positioned as “premium,” citing similar comfort, weaker visual cues, and limited information about feel and quality.

Insight 3

Sustainability benefits lacked clarity

While users noticed the recycled materials, they struggled to understand the broader environmental impact, reducing the perceived value of the premium option.

Insight 4

Limited colour choice reduced consideration

The single premium colour constrained appeal, with users indicating they would be more likely to consider the option if additional colours were available.

Deliver phase

Aligning on final decisions and shipping the experience

After sharing the usability findings, I collaborated closely with engineering, product, marketing, and the physical product teams to address the key challenges identified during testing and move toward launch.

Final design and product decisions:
• Reframed the bouclé fabric from “Premium” to “Luxe Edition” to better communicate its value
• Partnered with the category team to introduce an additional colour, increasing appeal and flexibility
• Simplified the material selection experience to balance usability with back-end complexity and delivery timelines

Implementing final design decisions on the product page

The Cushy Sofa Bed launched with the new fabric positioned as the Luxe Edition, supported by clearer education and comparison at key decision points.

What shipped:
• Luxe Edition available in two colour options
• “Take a closer look” modal for detailed fabric education
• Side-by-side comparison table to support confident material selection on the product detail page

Launching the new features on the Koala website

Redesigning the Cushy Sofa Bed product page to improve conversion

Discovery phase

Define phase

Design phase

Deliver phase

Outcomes

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