Bringing clarity to a noisy enterprise notification system

Overwhelmed by a flood of in-app and email alerts, IBM partners struggled to stay on top of relevant updates. I led the redesign of the notification system and communication preferences interface, streamlining how messages are delivered and giving users more control over what they receive and when.

Computer screen displaying IBM Partner Portal with notifications and updates.

Overview

Partners using the IBM Partner Portal were overwhelmed by the volume of in-app and email notifications. These messages included updates about contracting, portal activity, and other IBM Partner Plus program communications.

I led the effort to streamline these notifications and improve the communication preferences page, giving partners more control over what they receive and how. By reducing noise and focusing on what mattered most, we significantly cut the number of notifications sent and received positive feedback from partners who felt their experience was more manageable and personalized.

MY ROLE

Lead UX Designer
Front-end developer

TEAM

Design
Research
Product Owner
Development

TIME ON PROJECT

2022 - 2024

QUICK LINKS

Context
Research
User Flow
Explorations
Solutions
Reflection

Context

Starting point

Notifications are typically sent through both email and in-app, providing users with important updates, though there are not many options available for customizing their preferred methods of receiving these messages. The types of notifications that users receive vary depending on their specific user role.

Issues

Partner administrator roles receive the greatest number of communications regarding their account. This is multiplied for admins responsible for more than one partner account. There is only one option available on the communication preferences page, resulting in users having very limited control over how they receive all other categories of communication. In-app UI does not provide options to organize, sort, or delete notifications.

Goals

Less Emails

Minimize the overall volume of communications sent via email.

More Preferences

Implement an enhanced preferences management system for all partners.

Audit templates

Review our existing library of communication templates.

Research

I collaborated with a UX researcher to carry out a competitive analysis of various notification and communication preference user interfaces. We examined key features and usability aspects across several platforms to identify best practices and potential areas for improvement.

Mapping by persona

I mapped every unique notification that exists in the system to different roles with the aim of visualizing the volume of communications that are being sent to each user. I found that some partners can become quite overwhelmed by the volume of notifications that are be sent to them.

Mapping by category

Then, I mapped those same notifications to proposed default methods (in-app, email, both) while introducing new categories to the UI — actions, updates, and requests. Actions are tasks that require the partner to take action by a certain deadline. Updates include status updates, changes to their program tier, user management, and other information. Requests include employees requesting to associate themselves with their company within the portal.

User flow

These flows showcase several entry points a user can take to arrive at in-app notifications or communication preferences.

Flowchart showing different user scenarios for updating communication preferences, viewing notifications on a portal, handling relationship revalidation, and making contract changes. The diagrams illustrate steps in a user interface, including home pages, email notifications, dashboards, and contract management features.

Explorations

In-app notifications

After deciding to introduce categories to the UI (actions, updates, and requests), I spent some time exploring different navigation types. I started by using a tab design across the top of the body and I eventually created a navigation pattern that resides on the left side of the page. This pattern aligns closer to how users typically navigate through an inbox.

Communication preferences

Our long-term goal for preferences is to expand the method selection to include opt-out options, while also introducing controls for frequency that would allow partners to schedule the delivery of certain types of communications.

Solutions

In-app notifications

The redesign added Actions and Updates to the experience, while Requests were integrated into another area of the portal. Actions show a countdown to their due date in both the preview and expanded panel. Users can now move notifications to a Saved folder for reference later, or a Deleted folder. Notifications in the Saved folder stay until removed by the user, while those in the Deleted folder are permanently cleared after 30 days.

Notification enhancements

Options to mark a notification as unread, move to Saved, or Delete a notification were introduced to all notifications.

Action notifications included a countdown tag to remind partners to address time-sensitive tasks. Highlighting these notifications was essential, as not completing them could lead to being downgraded to a lower program tier, contract termination, or other consequences.

Global notification drawer

I also made enhancements to the global notification drawer to mirror the updates made to the in-app notifications UI.

Communication preferences

The updated preferences page allows users to choose how they want to receive notifications and opt-out of non-essential communications. Several preference categories were introduced, each featuring collapsible sections for easier navigation. These preferences varied based on user roles.

Reflection

Through research, planning, and cross-functional collaboration, we successfully launched an MVP in Summer 2024. The project allowed us to audit and categorize IBM Partner Portal notifications in a way that made them easier for partners to understand and manage. As a result, we reduced email notifications by 40% and received positive feedback from partners who appreciated the more relevant, streamlined experience.

This project also highlighted how often our communication was defaulted to email when it could be built into the product. For example, company admins were getting too many emails when employees requested to join their company. A better long-term solution would be to handle those requests directly in the portal, making it easier to manage everything in one place.