Wikibuy: a better buying engine
2013–2016
Helping online buyers find the best price on anything you can buy on Amazon.
Design Director, Wikibuy
led team of 2 designers, contractors
Wikibuy was acquired by Capital One in 2018.
Problem
When shopping online, buyers often opt for a convenient one-click solution over getting the best price they can, even if a little more sleuthing could save them big. But what if your browser did the hard work for you? Wikibuy automatically searches other stores for your exact item (including size and color) as you shop on Amazon, automatically applies the best coupon code, and lets you know when prices drop on products you've viewed and purchased.
Role
I joined Wikibuy as the first employee, working out of a one-bedroom apartment with the founders. Over the first three years, we grew the team to 50 employees, raised millions, and honed the product vision over multiple pivots. As Design Director, I owned the brand and design system, from illustrations to micro-interactions. I managed the design team, led daily front end engineering stand-ups, updated the board on product strategy, designed and pitched fundraising decks, and generally did whatever it took to keep the trains running.
Outcome
Wikibuy made it fast and painless to comparison shop and check out on thousands of sites. We bet hard on the impact of providing a better experience and won. In 2018, the company was acquired by Capital One and an iteration of our browser extension is now offered as Capital One Shopping. While the current site focuses more heavily on affiliate traffic, many of the visual elements (and microcopy!) from my designs are still in use.
X-factor
Working at Wikibuy gave me the opportunity to curate an entire customer experience from brand voice to product design. I managed my first team here and experienced a step-function increase in responsibility and ownership from anything I’d ever done before.
The brand and voice
We defined the Wikibuy voice as smart, but not condescending, price conscious but not cheap. I created the visual identity in-house after engaging with multiple agencies and conducting extensive naming research. We wanted Wikibuy to feel inviting and reliable.
As a part of the brand, we created patterns based on US currency to give a subtle nod to money (just in case the bright green wasn't enough).
The browser extension and mobile app
Here’s how it works: While a customer shops on Amazon, Wikibuy checks for better prices in the background.
When there is a better price, the browser extension pops up to notify you. If the customer has already found the best price, comparable products at lower total prices may be offered. Wikibuy also acts as a singular checkout experience for any retailer, streamlining the experience. No matter where you buy, it's two clicks to check out with Wikibuy. If anything goes wrong, Wikibuy is on the hook to make it right.
Internal tools
For the first few months of 2015, we focused exclusively on internal tools that made automated checkout on hundreds of retailers.
We invested heavily in site automation, creating the tools that non-developers (primarily Customer Success Agents in Austin and in some cases, Mechanical Turks worldwide) would need to be able to automate sites in an inexpensive, easily maintainable way. This tool, ScriptBuddy, helped Ops Specialists write checkout scripts, gamifying the process to make it a little less tedious.