User Research and Design Services in Action: Transforming Deloitte Insights' ConsumerSignals Dashboard

See how Sandstorm’s strategic user research and design services redefined a global data dashboard, delivering exceptional engagement and measurable results.

Summary:
Discover how user research and innovative design can transform a complex data dashboard into an engaging, user-centric experience. Through our ongoing partnership with Deloitte, Sandstorm redefined the Deloitte Insights ConsumerSignals Dashboard, making it an invaluable tool for global professionals across industries. This blog post delves into our collaborative approach including foundational user research, interactive workshops, high-fidelity prototypes, usability testing, and finalizing the user interface. The results: a 51% increase in traffic and significant improvements in user engagement.

A Defined User Experience is the Foundation for Success

We became Deloitte’s user research and design services partner to help define and enhance its overall user experience. Through our multi-year engagement, we led usability studies to test the Deloitte Global website’s ongoing design enhancements, navigation changes, and overall usability.

We also conducted in-depth user research to develop comprehensive personas and user journeys for Deloitte Insights. Our one-on-one interviews with their target audiences, including Fortune 500 C-suite executives, identified three distinct personas that guided Deloitte Insights’ decision-making. User flows for each persona were created to reveal essential touchpoints and pain points to be addressed in all of Deloitte Insights’ interactions.

Bringing Data to Life Through User Insights

We then went on to redesign the Deloitte Insights ConsumerSignals Dashboard, transforming it into a comprehensive destination for consumer behavior data. The primary goals were to modernize the dashboard, elevate the Deloitte Insights brand, and improve the user experience through accessible interactive data visualizations and a flexible, component-based design.

Our design process began with a series of interactive workshops aimed at aligning with Deloitte Insights’ strategic objectives and gathering comprehensive input from stakeholders. These workshops allowed us to set a strong foundation for the redesign by understanding the dashboard’s goals and mapping out critical content and feature requirements.

Workshop Highlights

• Defining the Vision: Unpacked the existing dashboard and established a clear modernization plan.
• Feature Prioritization: Outlined key content modules, interactions, and data visualization requirements, while also recognizing that the dashboard needs to be flexible for new data sets and charts.
• Stakeholder Engagement: Facilitated collaboration to capture diverse perspectives on what the final product should deliver.

Designing for the Entire User Journey

After the workshops, we developed a series of questions to guide the design and functionality of the dashboard. These questions were informed by the personas and user journeys, allowing us to empathize with users and address their needs throughout the experience:

• Pre-Interaction Steps: What drives users to seek consumer behavior data? What business needs and resources do they rely on before accessing the dashboard?
• During-Interaction Steps: How do users engage with and navigate the dashboard to fulfill their needs? What additional information and features would be helpful?
• Post-Interaction Steps: How do users integrate the data into their workflows? Do they share insights with their teams or use them to inform strategic decisions and reports?

By considering the entire user journey, the dashboard design provided a comprehensive and user-centric experience that resulted in our UX strategy. This allowed the users to stay more engaged with the dashboard as more features and data updates were added.

Prototype Development and Testing: Bringing Research to Life

With our UX strategy in hand, we created a high-fidelity, clickable prototype that included features like:

• Customizable Data Views: Enabled users to filter by industry, region, and time frame for personalized insights.
• Interactive Visuals: Included bold, clear charts with labeled axes and intuitive navigation.
• Personalized Exploration: Implemented a "choose your own adventure" approach that empowered users to navigate data as they wished

To ensure what we had created would resonate with our target audience, we conducted 45-minute, task-based usability studies with participants who matched Deloitte Insights’ key personas. This step was essential in validating our prototype and uncovering areas of improvement.

Refining the User Interface for Accessibility and Usability

Using insights from usability research, we made targeted improvements to the UI to ensure an intuitive and seamless experience. For example, one key enhancement included creating an introductory guide to clearly explain the tool’s purpose and provide usage instructions. We also refined the in-page navigation by reorganizing and labeling content modules for easier access and comprehension.

Next, based on how the users used the prototype and wanted to interact with the data, we needed to create a visual language to present the data in any scenario so it was quickly understood. It was crucial to develop a design system that was accessible, flexible, and easily manipulated and understood by our global users.

Beginning With Color

Our team created a color palette to accommodate the 25 countries represented in the charts. Each color was tested to ensure it maintained a 3:1 contrast ratio required for WCAG 2.1 compliance for graphics and user interface components against a white background. However, we discovered that achieving this level of contrast while keeping the data legible and visually distinct was not feasible.

To address this, we moved beyond color by introducing additional visual elements. Seven distinct line styles with varying dash patterns were created, along with ten marker styles—including circles, squares, triangles, diamonds, and stars, in both solid and outlined versions. These elements worked together to differentiate the data visualizations and clearly identify the data while preserving accessibility and readability.

Telling a Story

Another focus was on designing data to tell a story. Each chart was created to convey key insights, supported by relevant statistics and takeaways. Users could filter the data to focus on the information they sought and export customized views for use in reports, case studies, and presentations. The result was content that was scannable, interactive, and engaging.