The Challenge
Let’s talk about a major roadblock in Sephora Southeast Asia’s user experience: a lack of product reviews. Beauty shoppers rely on social proof to make purchasing decisions, and when they don’t find enough reviews, they go elsewhere. That means lost engagement, lost conversions, and lost revenue.
The solution? Leverage over 4 million reviews from Sephora’s US platform and integrate them seamlessly across eight markets (SG, MY, ID, TH, HK, PH, AU, NZ) on desktop, mobile, and app. Easy, right? Not quite. The challenge was to execute this without overwhelming users, breaking UX flows, or running into legal hurdles. That’s where I came in.
My Role
My responsibilities included:
Defining project scope and UX strategy
Running stakeholder interviews to align on goals and constraints
Conducting user research to identify behavior patterns and pain points
Designing wireframes and prototypes for a smooth integration
Managing priorities, scope creep, and timelines to ensure a streamlined rollout
The Approach
Let’s be real: dumping 4 million reviews onto the platform all at once wasn’t going to cut it. This needed a phased approach to keep UX intact while maximizing impact.
Phase 1: Import the Reviews
Get the US reviews live while ensuring compliance with content anonymity regulations.
Optimize how these reviews appear on-site to avoid overwhelming users.
Phase 2: Enhance & Expand
Introduce filtering and sorting features to improve discoverability.
Test additional UX enhancements based on real user feedback.
UX Strategy
No UX strategy is complete without a rock-solid research plan. I ran 5 in-depth user interviews to uncover key insights about how people interact with product reviews.
We focused on:
1.
How users engage with reviews
1.
Where do they look first? What’s a deal-breaker?
2.
What makes a review credible
1.
Is it the number of reviews? Star ratings? Review length?
3.
How users scan reviews
1.
Do they search for keywords? Prioritize certain details?
4.
The role of negative reviews
1.
Are they red flags or decision-makers?
5.
Location-based trust factors
1.
Does a review from a similar climate/country matter?
These insights shaped our strategy, ensuring we weren’t just adding reviews—we were making them useful.
The Research Findings
Here’s what we learned, in plain terms:
1.
More reviews = More trust
1.
Users feel more confident when they see a high volume of reviews. Simple as that.
2.
Keywords matter
1.
Shoppers don’t read everything. They scan for specific words that match their needs.
3.
Negative reviews are just as important as positive ones
1.
Users go straight to the bad reviews first to gauge potential deal-breakers.
4.
Climate matters
1.
Someone in Singapore isn’t going to trust a review from someone in New York if the product reacts differently in humid vs. dry weather.
Insights Example
Opportunities Example
Summary of Opportunities
The Solution: UX Improvements That Matter
It wasn’t about throwing in 4 million reviews and hoping for the best. We implemented targeted UX enhancements to make sure users could actually find and trust the right reviews:
Toggle for US Reviews & Climate Disclosure
Understand user behavior on “My Account” and “Order Pages.”
UI Enhancements for Scanning
I redesigned the review display for easier skimming, emphasizing key takeaways like product benefits and common concerns.
Cross-Platform Consistency
No matter where users shop, desktop, mobile site, iOS, or Android, the experience remains intuitive and streamlined.
Final Thoughts
This project was more than just importing reviews. It was about enhancing Sephora SEA’s entire UX strategy to drive engagement and sales. By combining research-driven insights with smart UX design, we created a seamless, intuitive experience that gives users the social proof they need without friction.