When it comes to commercial real estate data research, top financial institutions and real estate investors across the US and Europe use Green Street as their primary source. However, Green Street’s platform had grown increasingly difficult for users to navigate. We identified an opportunity to optimize the usability of their platform to better meet the vital needs of all users. We transformed Green Street’s existing commercial real estate platform into a customer-centric experience for B2B users through a complete redesign and new product launch.

Our Approach

We implemented an elaborate research-based approach for Green Street’s platform redesign and prioritized their existing users, goals, and most critical features. It was vital to test the improvement of SaaS KPIs with our new user experience to track success. Our service design process included close collaboration with the engineering and content teams to gain a comprehensive understanding of the product. Together, we were able to create a truly world-class, scalable Atomic Design system that could grow with the company.

Key Takeaways

• A Scalable Design Infrastructure

• A Research-Driven Process

• Information Architecture

•  Personalized Data-Driven Dashboard

• Mapping Interface for Location Based Data

• Interactive Charts and Graphs

A Scalable Design Infrastructure

Design System

The Green Street product is extensive and dynamic, so it was imperative that the new design system considered consistency and scalability.

We created an Atomic Design system from scratch that allowed engineers to develop new organisms instantaneously with every new requirement. We linked a master system across all Figma files to ensure an update anywhere would lead to an update everywhere.

A Research-Driven Process

Interviews and Usability Testing

Over the course of two months, we conducted 17 extensive user interviews and usability tests. Our research team worked closely with the Green Street product team to shadow users and accurately map out their journeys, behaviors, and needs.

Service Blueprint

Before beginning the work, our goal was to gain a clear understanding of the complexity of the existing business. To do this, we ran a series of service design workshops to gather every possible action along a series of touchpoints. This critical step allowed us to account for every scenario during the complex design transformation.

Information Architecture

Restructuring the Product

The platform experienced rapid growth over the years, and now was the time to view it from the user’s point of view. We conducted numerous usability tests and interviews that offered a clear understanding of how Green Street customers engaged with the product. We reorganized the products and offerings by aligning long-term business goals with those of Green Street’s users.

A Personalized Data-Driven Dashboard

In our work with stakeholders and users, we found that the dashboard was critical for users to locate information. Knowing this, our challenge was to simplify this experience for every user. The only way we could achieve this was to make the dashboard customizable. Our onboarding journey allowed us to learn what was important to each user and present a personalized dashboard approach.

Mapping Interface for Location-Based Data

Interactivity and Map UI

Real estate data is best understood in a mapping interface. Because we are accustomed to using maps to search for homes, rentals, and more in our daily lives, it was obvious to make this a key part of the interaction. The challenge was to present in-depth charting data linked to this mapping interface so that users could receive comprehensive information on the state of the real estate market for any given search area. We accomplished this by following heuristic best practices and combining customizable modules, such as tables and charts, along with the map UI.

Interactive Charts and Graphs

Prioritization

One of the most complex elements of the platform was the existing ability to slice and dice data in an infinite number of ways. Again, collaborating with the Green Street team and leveraging our user research, we reduced the number of possible interactive scenarios and prioritized the most used filters to create visual graphs and interactive charts.

Aggregation

As we all know, world events and other news have a significant impact on the real estate market. In order to provide this real-time information for the end user, Blank & Co. designed a data aggregation system. This allowed for news to be funneled into the Green Street ecosystem, cleaned, and made available to the end users in the most relevant way possible.

Our Collaboration

We worked closely with the Green Street engineering and product teams to bring the redesign to life. Our remote collaboration was programmed in weekly sprints for design deliverables across Miro, Figma, and Zoom.