Pure1 Commerce

Enhancing PureStorage’s Commerce Experience for Seamless Enterprise Storage Upgrades, Renewals, and Invoice Management

In 2023, PureStorage focused on improving the commerce experience on its enterprise software, Pure1, designed for partner sellers and consumers. Pure1 is a cloud-based, as-a-service data management platform from Pure Storage that simplifies both common and complex data management tasks. During this period, I designed strategies and features to enhancing the commerce platform to be more intuitive for users. My contributions were aimed at streamlining the infrastructure management process and improving the sells upscaling strategy to align with Pure1's core business model, subscription.

Quick Glimpse

Crafting Impactful User Experiences

Project Overview

Pure Storage is a leader in high-performance, all-flash data storage solutions for businesses. One of its key offerings is Pure1, a cloud-based platform that helps users easily monitor and manage their Pure Storage systems. To make Pure1 user-friendly and support its subscription-based model, the digital experience team has been enhancing the platform with new commerce features.These updates make it simple for users to buy new services or expand existing ones from the service catalog. These efforts ensure that managing and expanding data storage with Pure1 is smooth and straightforward, helping businesses stay ahead in their data management needs.

My Role and Team Composition

Business/Design Objectives

At Pure Storage, I contributed to the Digital Experience (DX) team, focusing on AI and ML-powered, cloud-based solutions for fleet management. Key areas of my work included:

1. Appliance End-of-Life Management: Designed the end-to-end experience to ensure proactive management and seamless operations before appliances reach end-of-life.\
2. Partner Subscription Renewal: Developed a comprehensive renewal and invoice management system, streamlining processes for partner sellers and reducing manual effort.
3. Capacity Visibility: Enhanced users' ability to monitor and optimize appliance capacity and usage for better investment returns.

I led the design process, collaborating with a VP, Product Directors, Managers, engineers, legal, marketing, and sales teams, from research and strategy definition to solution vision.

Appliance End-of-Life Management

• Design a seamless user experience that allows for easy monitoring and proactive management of appliance end-of-life, ensuring uninterrupted operations.

Comprehensive Partner Subscription Renewal Experience

• Create a user-friendly interface that streamlines appliance renewal and invoice management, eliminating unnecessary back-and-forth and delays for partners and customers.
  

Enhanced Capacity Visibility

• Develop intuitive data visualization that enhance user understanding of appliance capacity and usage patterns, facilitating informed decision-making and maximizing investment efficiency.
  

Metrics and KPIs

• Appliance End-of-Life Management
  • Percentage reduction in downtime due to proactive management.
  • Cost savings from reduced maintenance and downtime.
  • Number of proactive actions taken by users per month.
• Comprehensive Partner Subscription Renewal Experience
  • Average time to complete a renewal process.
  • Renewal conversion rate.
  • Renewal process efficiency - time saved per renewal.
    

• Enhanced Capacity Visibility
  • Percentage increase in appliance utilization rates.
  • User engagement with capacity monitoring features.
  • Reduction in over-provisioning or under-utilization instances.
    

Puzzle Pieces

Navigating Design Challenges

User Insights and Behavioral Analysis

To uncover the pain points for each feature, with a product managers I conducted a series of interviews with enterprise hardware administrators and partner sellers. From these in-depth research sessions, we developed detailed personas that represent the users needs and challenges.

The Challenge/Opportunites

• Seamless Appliance End-of-Life Management - Ensuring users can effectively manage the lifecycle of their storage appliances to prevent disruptions.
• Streamlined Partner Subscription Renewal Experience - Simplifying the renewal and invoice management process for partner sellers to enhance efficiency and reduce manual interventions.
• Enhanced Capacity Visibility and Management - Providing users with clear visibility and management options for both licensed and unlicensed appliance capacity.

Insight Expedition

Mapping the User Landscape

Appliance End-of-Life

Users struggle to easily monitor and manage the lifecycle of their storage appliances, leading to potential operational disruptions as appliances approach their end-of-life without adequate warnings or straightforward actions to upgrade or replace them.

Quote Renewal 

Partners and customers face difficulties with a complex and cumbersome process for appliance renewal and invoice management, leading to inefficiencies, delays, and frequent back-and-forth communication that complicates their workflow.

Capacity Utilization 

Users find it challenging to understand and track their appliance capacity and usage patterns due to unclear or complex data presentations, making it difficult to make informed decisions and fully utilize their investments efficiently.

User Flows

Innovation Hub

Cultivating Design Concepts

Appliance End-of-Life Management:

Appliance EOL Information on Home Page: Display EOL status prominently on the appliance cards located on the home page of Pure1.

Filtering and Sorting: Enable users to filter and sort appliances based on their EOL status.

Proactive Recommendations: Provide proactive recommendations for eligible appliances nearing or at EOL.

Contact Account Team: Allow users to easily contact their dedicated account team for appliances that do not have proactive recommendations.

Knowledge Base Integration: Include a prominent banner on the home page linking to a knowledge base article or resource center dedicated to EOL management.

Partner Subscription Renewal and Invoice Experience:

Approve Quote and Upload Purchase Order: Facilitate the sharing of quotes with partners for review and approval.

Dismiss Quote: Enable partners to dismiss quote when they don’t agree with details of the proposed quote.

Request Extension: Provide functionality for partners to request extensions on quote due dates.

Track Progress: Track when a quote has been sent, viewed, and approved, Upload by the customer.

Invoice Management

Capacity Visibility and Management:

Summary

As the lead UX designer, I took charge of several important projects for the Pure1 SaaS storage management platform. These included the Appliance End-of-Life feature, which gives users clear visibility and proactive management of hardware lifecycles, the Subscription Renewal and Invoice Management feature that automates renewals for a smoother user experience, and the Capacity Down Licensing feature to make the most of unlicensed capacity in customer appliances and encourage incremental upgrades. We conducted usability tests with partners and direct customers to fine-tune these features and expand our offerings. We also explored deeper connections with other platform features and launched these as General Availability for select partners, with continuous improvements along the way. Through this process, we learned how enhancing digital experiences can significantly benefit subscription businesses and make things easier for customers.