Transforming Live Shopping into a Curated, Trust-Driven Experience
My Role: UX Designer & Researcher
Team: Kali Birdsall, Apoorva Kavitkar, Mariel Go
Duration: 14 weeks
Tools: Figma, UX Metrics
01. Project Overview
Live shopping is booming, but it's broken. Platforms like TikTok Shop and Whatnot create chaotic, high-pressure experiences that leave users overwhelmed and distrustful. Despite the hype, most people watch but rarely buy.
Problem Statement: Current live shopping experiences fail both creators and consumers. Users perceive them as cheap, chaotic, and untrustworthy, while influencers lack a dedicated platform to showcase their products without getting lost across fragmented social media channels. Low-quality, scattered experiences undermine trust, engagement, and monetization for everyone involved.
How Might We…
…Make live shopping feel trustworthy, curated, premium, and engaging?
…Help influencers build and monetize their audience in one cohesive space?
The Solution: Livly reimagines live shopping as a boutique experience where buyer’s experience is #1, trusted influencers host curated events, verified reviews build confidence, and discovery feels effortless instead of overwhelming.
Through user research, we discovered that trust (not technology) was the #1 barrier to purchase. So we designed every feature to build credibility: transparent seller metrics, comprehensive product information, verified customer reviews, and an AI assistant that helps without pressure.
The result is a live shopping experience that feels like discovering products with a trusted friend, not being sold to by a stranger.
02. Research & Discovery
Competitor Research
Before designing anything, we needed to understand what existed and why it wasn't working. We analyzed leading live shopping platforms like TikTik Shop, Whatnot, Popshoplive, Taobao, Jamble, Amazon Live, and Instagram. We found common patterns:
Cluttered and chaotic interfaces that prioritized quantity over quality.
Low quality sellers, products, and video production value.
High-pressure tactics like countdown timers and limited stock warnings.
Minimal verification for sellers or product details.
Fragmented experiences across multiple platforms.
The opportunity was clear: users wanted live shopping to feel like a boutique instead of a yard sale.
User Interviews
To start, we conducted six 15-minute interviews with women aged 25 to 30 years old, who shop online frequently and follow influencers.
User interviews revealed that while most users had watched live shopping, few had ever actually made a purchase.
“I watch live shopping for entertainment, but I never actually buy anything. I don't trust it."
"It feels too chaotic. I can't get clear information about the products."
"The pressure to buy stresses me out. I need more time to think before I buy."
Key User Insights: What Users Really Want
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Trust & Authenticity
Users won’t participate or make purchases if they don’t trust the platform, hosts, and products. Trust, authenticity, and credibility are the #1 user needs.
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Fun Experience
Users want a fun, exclusive shopping experience that feels premium and relationship-driven. The platform must create a sense of connection, calm, and credibility (not chaos).
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Influencer Connections
Users enjoy discovering products through influencers they connect with, making genuine creator-audience relationships key to the experience.
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Low Pressure
Most users dislike the high-pressure selling tactics of most live shopping. Give them excitement without stress.
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Product Descriptions
Users want clear and reliable product details (zoom-ins, replays, stills, reviews, ratings) before buying.
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Personalization
Users want relevant hosts and product recommendations, and they want their chat questions answered in real time.
User Persona: Meet Jenny
To keep our user needs front and center, we created a persona based on our research.
Jenny is a 26-year-old marketing assistant who loves online shopping but approaches it methodically. She values quality, affordability, and trustworthy reviews. She follows influencers for authentic content but avoids impulsive decisions and chaotic experiences.
Target Users Defined
Our research indicated that our target users were Gen Z and younger Millennials who:
Enjoy discovering new products through interactive, social platforms.
Value style and authenticity in the influencers they follow.
03. Information Architecture
Six Principles for Organization
Based on our research, we established six guiding principles for structuring the app:
Be thoughtful about organization to help users confidently navigate and make decisions.
Keep the interface clean and minimal, avoid cluttered layouts or unfamiliar icons.
Provide clear and extensive details through quality descriptions, photos, and reviews.
Keep it engaging and fun, but without sales pressure (no bidding, no countdown timers).
Emphasize the "live" experience as the app's core identity.
Encourage discovery of both products and influencers for inspiration.
Testing Our Assumptions
We needed to validate our navigation structure before building wireframes, so we ran a Tree Testing study using UX Metrics. We tested our initial sitemap with 8 participants to see if they could find key information.
Success rate: 82.8%
Key insight: Users looked at products and influencers equally for inspiration and discovering trends. This finding was critical. It meant we couldn't prioritize one over the other.
The Sitemap
Our initial structure separated discovery into different sections, but our testing revealed users wanted it all in one place. This change made discovery effortless by letting users switch between event feeds, influencer profiles, and product categories without leaving the home screen.
We also simplified the live event structure, ensuring users could quickly jump between the stream, product details, seller profile, and chat without losing context.
04. Design & Iteration
Mapping the Core Journeys
We identified three task flows that our MVP needed to support:
1. Find and purchase an item from a live event
2. Explore influencer's full product range
2. Verify seller trustworthiness
From Hand Sketches…
We started with rapid hand sketches. They helped us quickly test different approaches:
What design patterns would work on the homepage?
How could we build trust through our design choices?
How could we keep the live video screen clean and minimal, while still including all the necessary elements?
What are the most important elements to include on each screen?
Where should product cards appear during a live stream?
Where should seller information live?
…To Low Fidelity Wireframes
…To Medium Fidelity Mockups
We took insights from user research and testing to improve and iteratively design our app.
05. Final Prototype
Live Demo
This video documents the happy path through the app. Try out the Figma prototype with this link.
06. Usability Testing
User Testing
We conducted five 30-minute moderated user tests with our low-fidelity prototype, asking participants to complete our three core task flows. Every piece of feedback pointed us toward specific improvements in our medium fidelity prototype.
What confused or frustrated users:
Certain icons on the live event screen were redundant or unclear.
"Your Edit" tab name (sounded like manual customization). We subsequently changed it to “For You”.
No indication of stock levels.
No way to filter search within a seller's store.
Missing visual indication of live chat activity.
What users liked:
Simplicity of layout.
Clear navigation between sections.
Seller metrics and reviews (built trust immediately).
Comprehensive product information.
AI assistant concept.
07. Impact & Next Steps
The Impact
Livly creates value for both sides of the marketplace. By solving for both, we created a sustainable ecosystem that benefits everyone.
For Buyers:
Discover products through trusted influencers.
Make confident purchases based on transparency.
Enjoy curated, pressure-free shopping experiences.
Get personalized recommendations.
For Influencers:
Dedicated platform to showcase products.
Build audience in one cohesive space.
Monetize authentically without algorithm battles.
Own the relationship with their community.
Next Steps
If we continued working on Livly, our roadmap would include:
Deeper personalization: Use behavioral data to improve "For You" recommendations and surface relevant events at the right time.
Influencer/seller experience: Design the tools creators need to host events, manage inventory, and engage their audience.
Post-purchase features: Develop order tracking, easy returns, and review prompts to close the loop.
Live testing: Partner with real influencers and buyers to validate our designs.
Community features: Explore ways for users to connect with each other, share finds, and create wishlists together.
