Aztro Marketplace
Aztro was the first design-focused online wholesale and trade marketplace, bringing together 100 brands from around the world with thousands of U.S. buyers. As Founder and CEO, I led the development of a seamless customer experience, combining digital innovation with business strategy to create a platform that not only facilitated transactions but also strengthened relationships between brands and buyers.
For Who
Three types of customers, three different needs. Aztro helped create relationships between international brands that want to enter the market without an astronomical upfront investment and retailers and interior decorators looking to differentiate from the local offering.
.jpeg)
Awareness
Conversion was a key priority, so we focused on making it seamless for different user groups to discover Aztro, understand its value, and sign up with confidence. We designed dedicated landing pages tailored to brands, retailers, and interior designers, ensuring each audience saw messaging and features relevant to their needs. By analyzing metrics and user feedback, we continuously refined these pages, ultimately driving a significant increase in brand sign-ups and strengthening our marketplace’s growth.
The Perfect Landing
Conversion was one of our main KPIs, so we did much work to make it easier for different users to learn, evaluate, and create an account with us. Landing pages played a key role, and we created pages for brands, retailers, and interior designers. Based on metrics and user feedback we developed numerous landing pages that ultimately led to converting a large number of prospect brands.
Communicating our Brands' Vision
We aimed to not only display products but to elevate each brand’s story, capturing the craftsmanship and care behind their work. Every brand had a dedicated profile where users could explore their products alongside rich content like videos, policies, catalogs, and lookbooks—bringing their identity to life. This section became a cornerstone of our platform, reinforcing trust and engagement. Below are early sketches and wireframes we created to clearly convey our vision to the development team, ensuring a seamless and visually compelling experience.
Seamless Wholesale Experiece
Since Aztro focused on wholesale orders, we needed a cart that was both intuitive and efficient. Retailers and trade agents had to meet brand-specific minimums, so we designed a system that clearly displayed individual brand totals while allowing users to check out from one or multiple brands based on their eligibility.Understanding that the cart was a key decision point—where buyers reassessed their selections and allocated budgets—we streamlined the experience by removing unnecessary details, ensuring only the most critical information was presented. This approach reduced friction and made large-order management simpler and more transparent.
Focusing on customer needs
We actively collaborated with our retailer and trade partners to refine our product offerings based on their needs. Recognizing key pain points, we developed the "Personal Shopper" program—an initiative that helped stores and interior designers discover products based on budget, deadlines, and special occasions. This personalized approach not only streamlined the buying process but also boosted sales by 18% in just two months.
To make the experience even more tailored, we implemented a survey to gather key preferences, enabling our sales team to curate customized wishlists and lookbooks for each client. This hands-on strategy strengthened relationships and drove higher conversion rates.
Collateral
While Aztro’s core value was a digital trade show and marketplace, we recognized that many of our customers were accustomed to a more traditional way of discovering products. In 2020, we introduced a downloadable catalog and lookbook, creating a new traffic channel while giving buyers a way to explore our offerings offline. This simple yet impactful addition not only enhanced accessibility but also significantly boosted our email marketing conversion rates—capturing more buyers who were drawn in by the curated presentation of our products in one beautifully designed document.
