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In a crazy turn of events

you just inherited
an eccentric
millionaire's house.

The rooms seem normal,

but the harder you look, the reality of the chaos sets in.

You know things need to change, so the question is

do you renovate what already exists or rebuild from the ground up?

CarMax Information Architecture
3 min. read
Product Designer:
Myself
Product Manager:
Hope Norman
Delivery Manager:
Michele Eckert
Analyst:
Amanda Enquist
In 2020, the CarMax app was that house.

Within the first couple of weeks of joining the app team I began to understand how disorganized it truly was. Our five main tabs were either crammed with mismatched furniture or nearly empty. Doors led to dead-ends, beds were put in the closet, and every room had a toilet for some reason.

As a product team it was our responsibility to fix it up, make sure guests feel at home when they visit, and make future renovations as easy as possible.
Making a Blueprint
Before making changes to a house, you need a blueprint. Inside each tab I captured each screen, documented how they connect to one another and identified the key user actions.

Our blueprint included user behavior metrics such as the number of visitors per page, the duration of their stay, and the pages they visited before and after.
multiple app screens with connecting lines
A Full-Scale Audit
or How I Learned to Stop Guessing and Love Adobe Analytics
Adobe Analytics was the key in creating our blueprint. It showed us how long people spent in the app, which buttons they tapped, and which pages made them leave. With all that data, we realized it was time for a major overhaul. But first, we needed to help our stakeholders understand the ‘why'. So, we started with a simple question:
How many of our users are visiting each of our 5 main tabs?
Home
90
%
(+5.6%)
of users
More
30
%
(+5.6%)
of users
MyCarMax
30
%
(+5.6%)
of users
Sell
12
%
(+5.6%)
of users
Stores
5
%
(+5.6%)
of users
What's Behind Door #1
Lorem ipsum
Those five numbers provided the foundation we needed to convince our stakeholders that a renovation was necessary. While we didn’t expect equal usage across all five tabs, the low engagement in Sell and Stores stood out as a red flag.

It was clear we had to ensure users found value in every part of the app, no matter which tab they visited. Our next step was to document the key user actions within each of these tabs. Knowing these actions might help us understand why the usage rates were so varied.
Home
Cars Near You
Filter Cars Function
Inventory of All Cars for Sale
Recent Searches
Recently Viewed Cars
Recommended Cars for You
Schedule Store Appointment
Search Bar
Sort Cars Function
Vehicle Details
Vehicle Images
Vehicle Price Calculator
More
App Settings
Contact Us
FAQs
Feedback Forms
Financing Information
Monthly Price Calculator
My Profile Details
Register / Create Profile
MyCarMax
"My Car" Details
Saved Cars
Saved Searches
Scheduled Appointment Details
Sell
Car Trade-In Information
Stores
All Stores
Nearest Store
What Would Marie Kondo Do?
(ノ°∀°)ノ⌒・*:.。. joy.。.:*・゜゚・*☆
We basically bought a 5 bedroom house, crammed all of our furniture into just 1 room, then stayed inside that room and barely stepped into the other ones.

Our final task was to find a way to spread out the app's features so that we encourage our users to explore, spend more time in the app, and see the value the app brings no matter which tab they visited. Instead of guessing our new info architecture, I ran an extensive card sorting study with existing and future features.
Time to spark joy with...
Card Sorting by the Numbers
29
Actions to Sort
5
m
20
s
Average Sorting Time
90
Participants in Total
This New House
Airing on PBS at 4PM EST
The card sorting study gave us the new framing we needed for information architecture. We had a few guesses of what would change but nothing concrete. Here were our key findings:
Searching
All Stores
Filter Cars Function
Inventory of All Cars for Sale
Nearest Store
Search Bar
Sort Cars Function
Vehicle Details
Vehicle Images
Account or Profile
App Settings
Contact Us
FAQs
Feedback Forms
"My Car" Details
My Profile Details
Register / Create Profile
Schedule Store Appointment
Scheduled Appointment Details
In-Store Shopping Companion
Personalization
Cars Near You
Recent Searches
Recently Viewed Cars
Recommended Cars for You
Saved Cars
Saved Searches
Finance
Car Trade-In Estimate
Car Trade-In Information
Financing Information
Monthly Price Calculator
Vehicle Price Calculator
From House to Home
⋆˙⟡ Live ⋆˙⟡ Laugh ✧˖°. Lunchables ✧˖°.
A brand new information architecture is great in theory but what about implementation? After extensive user interviews and testing, we launched our new IA and after 3 months the results spoke for themselves.
Home
95
%
(+5.6%)
of users
Favorites
50
%
(+5.6%)
of users
Profile
40
%
(+5.6%)
of users
Finance
20
%
(+5.6%)
of users
Bold Accent Walls
#053361 to be exact
All this effort to rearrange the rooms and rebuild the walls wouldn't be complete without rethinking the furniture and decor. We used this overhaul to showcase a push for brand forward designs with bolder typography, dark blues, and a cleaner more modern take on layout helped bring this story home.


While not all of these designs came to life, much of the research was eventually fully fleshed out.
...and here are the designs as I left them in 2021.
A Word on Mobile
A good product is designed for the proper modality. This is why I've chosen to not displayed my design work in a mobile viewport. In order to get the best experience please view this website on a laptop or larger.
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