About Promotion Studio

I built this prototype when I was last job seeking.

The role was for a senior PM position that would work on internal tooling in support of merchandising and marketing. I was told the current promotions process required development time and took that to mean they did not have a proper promotional CMS product, and likely had an Excel-driven process that would get handed from a buyer or marketing manager to a developer to actually get enacted.

I took this as an opportunity to flex my old ecommerce skills and imagine how this business functions and what my stakeholders would consider. This type of business coordinates a customer, a personal shopper, and a local brick-and-mortar store. The business needs to navigate relationships with the logo (the retail chain), its actual locations, the shoppers and the end customers.

I analyzed how the site handled products that would be common among logos, and looked through the types of promotions, believing they would be a mix of coupons, price reductions and “buy more, save more” offers, mostly price driven and sometimes run in collaboration with the logo or the vendor. I also wondered whether minimum advertised price (MAP) policies would come into play, since the purchase actually happens in the store.

During the actual interview, I mentioned having prepared a prototype to show, and towards the end I asked if now would be a good time to demonstrate it. I talked through my thought process: who my stakeholders were and what they cared about. Then I talked about how this artifact is meant to be a discussion point with my stakeholders and then handed to a development team. The intent is definitely not to be dispositive to the developers; rather, it is like a clickable mockup or prototype, akin to what you might get from Figma, but arguably better.

Did it work? Well, I am not employed there, so in that sense, no. However, I would say as a proof point of the way I think through a business, its stakeholders and how I think through problems, absolutely.