Carrie Oprea

Carrie OpreaCarrie OpreaCarrie Oprea

Carrie Oprea

Carrie OpreaCarrie OpreaCarrie Oprea
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An intuitive shopping experience for busy professionals

Modern commerce, tailored for today's buyer

ShopULstandards.com • UX design & research

This project was a full redesign of ULSE's e-commerce site to address critical usability issues around the search and purchasing process for industry standards. Through stakeholder interviews, competitive analysis and usability testing, we uncovered friction in locating the right standards and navigating checkout. We facilitated collaborative workshops, developed wireframes, and delivered hi-fidelity designs that streamlined search, clarified content, and improved user flow end-to-end.

Research & discovery

We interviewed users and stakeholders to uncover why the ShopUL experience felt frustrating. Key issues included poor search, unclear product details, and confusing purchase flow. Competitive analysis highlighted best practices we used to guide a more intuitive, trustworthy experience.

Stakeholder interviews

Gathered insights from internal teams to understand business goals, recurring user complaints, and technical constraints. Helped align the project around both user needs and business priorities.

User interviews

Spoke with frequent users of ShopUL who expressed confusion with search terms, difficulty distinguishing between similar standards, and uncertainty about licensing or formats during checkout.

Heuristic evaluation

Reviewed the existing site using UX best practices to identify usability flaws in navigation, content hierarchy, and purchase flow.

Competitive & comparative analysis

Studied how other platforms (both standards-focused and general e-commerce) handled search, filtering, product clarity, and digital licensing to identify useful patterns and missed opportunities.

Key findings:

  • Search results were too broad and unfiltered
  • Product pages lacked clarity around licensing, file types, and versions
  • Users didn't trust the purchase process and often hesitated to complete transactions
  • The overall flow lacked guidance and left users unsure of their next step

User personas & journey map

We developed user personas based on user interviews and purchasing behavior and mapped their end-to-end journey across tasks like searching, reviewing product details, and completing a purchase.

Manny the manufacturer

We found that the majority of the site visitors worked in manufacturing so we created Manny the manufacturer. Manny has worked in procurement for a large multinational power and energy corporation for over 25 years. He works closely with engineers, designers and other manufacturing roles to ensure they are working from the latest standards. Their goal is to make sure their products are built to code, ensuring consumer safety while their product is in use.

Future-state journey

This future-state journey showcases Manny's ideal experience as he seamlessly creates a user profile, searches standards and gets the information he needs so he can confidently and knowingly make a purchase.

Design process

Our goal was to simplify the search and purchase experience by creating a more intuitive, trust--worthy and user-centered interface.

1. Define the experience

3. Iterative testing & feedback

2. Wireframing & ideation

Translated research insights into design goals:


  • Help users quickly find relevant standards
  • Clarify what they're purchasing
  • Reduce friction and drop-off during checkout

2. Wireframing & ideation

3. Iterative testing & feedback

2. Wireframing & ideation

Created early concepts for:


  • Improved search and filter structure
  • Cleaner product detail pages with licensing clarity
  • A more transparent, step-by-step checkout process

3. Iterative testing & feedback

3. Iterative testing & feedback

3. Iterative testing & feedback

Conducted usability testing with target users on mid-fidelity prototypes. Key refinements include:


  • Surfacing key product metadata earlier
  • Simplifying filter labels and interactions
  • Adding progress indicators to checkout

4. High-fidelity design

We delivered polished, responsive screens that:

  • Reduced cognitive load with clearer hierarchy and labeling
  • Replaced dense product pages with digestible content blocks
  • Included trust signals (ie licensing info, support links, validation pages)

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