00. context

99 Tracker was architected as an adaptive mobile-responsive platform to visualize and manage last-mile deliveries for 99 Minutos, a major Mexican ecommerce delivery provider. Prior to this project, 65% of deliveries were not successfully completed, primarily because users lacked clear communication and visibility into delivery status.

As the Product Designer working alongside engineering and product leadership, my responsibility was to ground design decisions in data and align business needs with user expectations

Project goal:
Improve delivery success by helping users anticipate and act on delivery events more effectively.

01. understanding

Benchmarking and API Research:

To understand similar services on the market, user expectations and other nuances, I did competitive studies, analyzed their UVPs, helpful features, and common user complaints.

This clients UVP (99 Minutos) is the ability to track in real-time an “immediate” e-commerce delivery.

Challenges 99 Minutos had before 99 Tracker:

1. 65% of deliveries weren't successfully completed
   Due to lack of communication with the end-user, the delivery status was unknown and therefore, not received.

2. Lack of trust and reliability
   The only communication channel was poorly designed giving it an unofficial feel and because of this, was not used.

3. Unclear information and information absence
   The information provided on the emails wasn’t focused on user needs rendering useless and unimportant to them.
   

User testing and synthesis:

I conducted a user survey with 50 participants (ages 18–45). Key findings revealed major gaps in user comprehension and trust:

• 12% understood that the email notifications were intended to show delivery status

• 18% clicked through to the existing status page

• 86% had confused official tracking emails with spam or scams at least once

• 10% found the status page clear and easy to follow

• 78% expressed frustration about the inability to communicate with couriers directly

These numbers indicated that the primary pain was not a lack of access, but interpretation, trust, and actionability.

Insight generation:

I organized research findings through affinity mapping and worked with the Product Manager to align with business KPIs. The research confirmed that:

• Communication clarity was directly tied to delivery success

• Users needed precise real-time tracking and interaction possibilities

• Trust in the communications channel (email) was critical to engagement

02. key points to target

03. solutions

Lo-Fi Wireframes

After synthesizing research, I developed low-fidelity wireframes for both the core platform and redesigned email notifications. Early stakeholder resistance focused on minimizing investment in email redesigns. However, validation testing contradicted this, showing 80% of users were confused or dismissive of the original emails — a clear signal that the communication channel itself needed redesign, not just incremental UI tweaks.

This evidence persuaded stakeholders to allocate engineering resources to a full email redesign in addition to the core platform.

04. design

99 Minutos had a signature accent color, but no unified visual system. I retained the brand’s color while establishing consistent UI elements and layouts. This effort initiated discussions on a broader style guide to align other client products. I also produced CSS code to ensure fidelity between design comps and implementation, elevating design-to-dev handoffs.

05. validation

0.6 personal takeaways

The solution should always be based on users’ needs and pain points

I learned that design decisions must be grounded in research evidence, not intuition. In early ideation, I leaned on aesthetic ambition too heavily. Re-anchoring on user pain points ensured both design effectiveness and stakeholder alignment.

As this was one of my first projects where I was a lead, trying to come up with a really ‘wow’ solution was on my mind. It was easy for me to rely on my imagination and my aesthetics more than on the research. I felt my ambition was driving me away from the actual solution and I didn't want this project to turn into a vanity project.

I took my first designs created under ideation process and tore them apart trying to match every feature with the pain points and business KPIs. They didn’t comply as well as I wanted them to. So I revisited my research and try to read more upon delivery services to get a bigger scope.

After that pause, everything started running smoothly and fast, I was able to articulate my design decisions and reflect them in the final product.

This project taught me that we as designers should separate from our ego, and know we can benefit from participatory processes and lear a lot from people who don’t wear our ‘designer’ label.