Expedia Group

Lead Product Designer

Expedia Group (EG) needed to unify the entire business's email communication product and infrastructure across its portfolio of brands (Expedia, Hotels.com, Vrbo) to address declining engagement and operational inefficiencies. The existing system required significant improvements in scalability, data and technical capabilities, design system and brand alignment, and deployment processes.

I led the development and launch of a Universal Messaging Platform (UMP), creating a centralized, scalable design system that improved user experience and integration into every aspect of the customer journey, ensured accessibility compliance, and aligned with company-wide technical standards.

• Led development of company-wide email design system by leveraging existing universal design system standards, improving operational efficiency and establishing a single source of brand-consistent, foundational truth for email product design across the organization.
  

• Drove cross-functional alignment between principle product, design system, UX/UI Visual Identity, and Brand design teams to successfully implement new communication framework, ensuring technical feasibility and consistency while supporting rebranding and increased user engagement initiatives.

• Scaled product and system adoption across multiple UX Communication Design teams through comprehensive onboarding and training programs, leading to streamlined design-to-development timelines.

• Utilizing the new email product, successfully launched all email communication for EG's first cross-brand loyalty program, One Key.

• Established and maintained a design system and resource library with reusable components, consulting cross-functionally on new additions and design aspects while reducing development time and ensuring consistent brand experience across teams.

8 Core Members / ~ 50 Cross-Team Members

2 years (development, design, launch, iteration, documentation)

Expedia Group (EG)'s brands were functioning like independent businesses, rather than brands operating under the same parent company; EG initiated a company-wide reorg aimed towards becoming a "one stop shop" for travel needs. The company wanted to highlight individual brand benefits and cross-brand upsells in order to drive brand education, engagement, loyalty, and brand versatility.

While each brand's in-app experience played a large part in the overall user flow, many users didn't download the apps and solely relied on email, making email communication product a massive part of EG. Users receive all of their complex, data-driven brand communication through email - bookings, payment and itinerary info, shopping triggers, marketing, etc. At the time of the reorg, the existing communication products were fragmented, siloed and not scalable, causing operational inefficiencies and declining user engagement.

Below are five versions of the same Expedia email communication, used for Activity Purchase Confirmations. All examples were live at the same time, utilized for the exact same purpose, and largely differing design-wise from one another, contributing to user friction.

There was no cohesive design system or standardization across brands, multiple deployment platforms existed, designs and messaging were outdated and misaligned with the company's design system, and email experience didn't match in-app experience. Additionally, all UX communication design teams worked independently and each had their own engineering and development teams, contributing to an excess of duplicative work.

EG's goal was to implement a Universal Messaging Platform (UMP) - an email communication product that would serve as a singular, scalable email design system and deployment platform for all of EG's brands. The intention for the email product was to 1) aid in the business's reorg goal of customer education of EG's range of brands, and 2) solve for the disorganized, outdated design and deployment systems that were causing increased friction for both EG users and EG communication product teams. Due to the sheer size of EG, a full redesign was not in scope for this project; we were asked to leverage the existing systems and designs, and to only apply highly necessary updates.

The UMP communication product would create an internal company system and the associated external user system for email communication.

• Backend users = EG Employees - UX and brand designers, product teams, engineering, production, data and loyalty teams, etc.

• Front end users = EG Users - travelers engaging across all sections of the business would receive communications from and interact with the UMP product, benefitting from the consistency of a centralized communication system.

• Initial Scope: Create a centralized design system and deployment platform to standardize email communications across EG brands

• Challenge: Project complexity was significantly underestimated. The existing decentralized system contained thousands of inconsistent designs and data connections that required more than simple migration. Combined with concurrent company reorganization, this demanded a more comprehensive approach.

• Expanded Scope: Rather than transfer legacy designs, we needed to develop a scalable system that would solve for current use cases while supporting future growth. This required deep understanding of existing patterns and careful consideration of technical feasibility.

• Aggressive 6-month timeline

• Concurrent company-wide rebranding

• Technical limitations of new platform

• Knowledge gaps from ongoing reorganization

As this project spanned multiple teams, phases, and iterations, my role flexed to accommodate the workflow and project needs:

• Provided team focus: I identified that due to our existing outdated and divided systems, a full overhaul was needed for the product. I brought necessary teams together to discuss my concerns with simply adjusting the existing systems. It was clear to me that to build more on top of a broken and low-functioning system would not be the best path forward, especially due to the business need for a centralized and scalable product system.

• Cross-functional collaboration: I worked ensure product, design, visual identity, brand, and technical capabilities were cohesive and feasible.

• Design system creation: I led the development/design of the new product, created a company-wide email communication design system based within EG's existing overarching design system, and worked closely with engineering to ensure technical capabilities and functionality were possible with the proposed system.

• System governance + scaling: I documented the email design system and usage details, onboarded designers and teams across the business, and created reusable templates based on the new system/components. I maintained ongoing management of the design system and library in Figma, acted as a resource and consultant to other teams as they learned and leveraged the system, and created new system components based on needs and requests.

I conducted a comprehensive audit of EG's email communications, researching context and info to optimize user experience and standardize design patterns. Through analysis of live examples and user flows across categories, I created a structured library of key modules and content types.

My findings revealed significant inconsistencies in template design within the same email categories due to different generation methods and inadequate content management. Analysis of the transactional email category highlighted opportunities to improve information architecture, particularly in data-heavy communications. Based on this, our team shared overall recommendations for standardized templates, strategic use of progressive disclosure to enhance user engagement, and email best practice and a11y guidance.

This presented a challenge - senior leadership stressed a full redesign wasn't in scope. Since it wasn't logical to transfer obvious flaws, patterns, and designs to a new system where they’d need to be addressed later and might be further built upon, I updated pieces in an effective way without huge structural changes.

I advocated for my recommendations, emphasizing that an email design system update was critical to the project's success; this idea wasn't agreed upon at the time, so we proceeded with updates rather than a full system update.

Using the general wireframes from the audit, I created a comprehensive library to house our new official email design system. The goal of this library was to provide pre-defined modules to support email template design, review process, and handoff to dev production. The modules within the library would be flexible for content and brand needs.

Since the existing communication designs from the audit were not largely aligned with EG's company-wide design system (EGDS), my work during this time consisted of using EGDS components as a guide to translate designs. This would create a consistent, scalable email design system across all of EG's communications and brands.

I led the alignment of email communications with EG's global design system (EGDS), creating a unified foundation across all brands. Through strategic cross-functional collaboration with Product and Engineering teams, I identified and bridged communication gaps between siloed teams, establishing consistent user experiences across channels and aligning design standards for my team. This systematic approach not only improved user journey cohesion but also fostered cross-team visibility and collaboration, ensuring design continuity and scalability throughout the organization while enhancing operational efficiency.

I partnered with Engineering to ensure technical feasibility of key communication modules, enabling a successful deployment of UMP's first cross-brand product launch. The UMP product launch was used for the launch of EG's first cross-brand loyalty program, One Key, effectively serving as a launch for both the loyalty program and the system we'd designed.

I identified critical scalability and design issues during the initial UMP product launch that would impact long-term business success. Based on product insights and user analysis, I advocated for a comprehensive redesign focused on system-wide scalability rather than short-term fixes. There were conflicting points of view on a full redesign, as some SHs prioritized immediate launches while others prioritized the scalability of the system. I successfully defended the need for and led the design of a robust design foundation that would support all future cross-brand communications. This strategic approach prioritized user engagement through consistent experiences, improved usability, and streamlined design patterns—establishing a sustainable foundation for EG's communication ecosystem.

Through rigorous analysis of both launch performances (UMP design system and the One Key cross-brand loyalty program), I identified opportunities to optimize the system for EG's evolving cross-brand strategy. Based on these findings, I successfully advocated for the system-wide redesign I'd originally suggested, bringing together lead UX and product designers from the company-wide design system team, brand teams, and One Key stakeholders to create a more robust foundation.

I led the strategic redesign of core components and modules, as well as system components to support One Key's post-launch expanding business module. This ensured scalability across Expedia, Hotels.com, and Vrbo while maintaining brand coherence. Our strategic renovation of the design system established a foundation capable of supporting EG's broader cross-brand initiatives and projected business growth.

I worked closely with Engineering to revise the UMP product design system, establishing a process so current designs and projects would not be disrupted in the process of integrating the redesigned design system.

We completed this successfully and with much positive feedback; the design system and product significantly increased alignment to business goals and designs across other teams and products, creating a more simplistic and straightforward method of email creation and deployment.

I developed and maintained a comprehensive UMP email design system library as our single source of truth across EG, scaling it to meet expanding product scope and complexity. I also contributed largely to processes from design to reviews to handoff, leveraging my thorough understanding of the system to aid in efficient processes.

I structured the documentation to serve multiple user groups—from designers needing detailed component specifications to stakeholders requiring high-level understanding. This strategic approach to system documentation improved design consistency, cross-functional collaboration, streamlined onboarding, and enabled efficient implementation across all EG teams, regardless of technical expertise.

I led company-wide adoption of the UMP email design system, successfully onboarding diverse teams from designers to stakeholders. As the system's key design expert, I guided teams through the transition from siloed processes to a unified approach, providing comprehensive training and support.

This strategic implementation improved cross-functional collaboration, reduced redundant work, and established consistent design practices across EG. Despite initial knowledge gaps, the system's efficiency benefits drove strong adoption, ultimately streamlining workflows and reducing time spent on one-off solutions. We were able to ensure effective implementation at scale, establishing design practices organization-wide.

Since the UMP product launch, I have:

• Sustained ongoing management and maintenance of the UMP product's design system, library, and associated resources.

• Continued cross-functional workflows with Product, UX, and branding to ensure the design system flexes with business changes

• Served as a consultant to communication UX teams looking to improve user experience or new designs within the UMP system

• Design and implement new components, modules, and product suites for the system upon request, for specific projects, and for exploratory work

• Established first unified email communication design system across all EG brands, significantly reducing inconsistencies in customer communications and creating a strong foundation for future growth initiatives.

• Improved communication design system adoption led email engagement of 12M+ active monthly members to increase by ~275K/mo during 1st year of implementation

• Reduced design-to-development time by 45% with standardized components

• Achieved 85% adoption rate across all of EG's international brands

• Streamlined cross-functional workflow between design and engineering, reducing production time by 35%

• Methods to scale my logic, strategy, and design skills across multiple intricate systems and cross-team goals

• The need for vigilant documentation, both for myself and cross-team consistency; share knowledge when you have it

• Product design, UX, and branding are ever-evolving, and as soon as you solidify something, another piece may shift; being flexible to rethink project aspects is a highly necessary skill