MCT Group is one of Australia’s biggest automotive companies. Between their handful of brands, they offer a gamut of services to do with the automotive industry, including buying and selling vehicles, servicing, roadworthy certificates and even loans.
Design System for a Bespoke CRM Suite
Creating and implementing a design system for use across multiple interconnected CRM products
Product
Internal System
The Problem
Our client were expanding at a rapid pace and their old "pen and paper" methods were increasingly falling short. The head of sales was personally managing all customer relationships, and committing the mountain of information pertaining to those customers and their vehicles to memory. The business could collapse if the head of sales were to go on vacation.
The Solution
A system that could consolidate the plethora of data they are required to collect and automate some of their processes, as well as house their entire stable of brands.
THE PROCESS
Discovering the moving parts
We conducted interviews with each of the relevant parties to piece together the existing process and figure out what steps could be automated. We developed a scope document which detailed how data would be collected & stored, and how automation would play a part. That scope doc would become a requirements document and would evolve as we progressed through flow diagrams and wireframes. We decided at this point that we should have 3 distinct interconnected systems; the main CRM, the inspections app (for third-party inspectors), and the wholesale auctions portal (for selling cars to dealerships).
THE PROCESS
A system for a suite
Once wireframes were partially signed off. I turned my attention to how the final designs would look. I conducted research into existing CRM systems and AR applications (for the inspections portal). I wanted to produce a design system that would be used across each of the products to create a unified experience and simplify development, while allowing each system to stand alone, since they would be used by different people. To piece the design system together quicker, I worked with the developers and we decided to base the system on TailwindUI, which would also allow them to build out elements at a rapid pace.
Check out TailwindUI
THE PROCESS
Products for days...
With a design system (partial) in place, I began focusing in on the UI for each of the products. We started with the CRM itself, majority of which would be large data-heavy tables and forms. Next was the wholesale auction system, which I designed as a simple one-page website. This was the only part of the system which would show MCT branding, outside of the CRM login screen. Lastly, I designed the inspections app, which streamlined the inspection process and significantly reduced the possibility of errors by guiding the assessor step by step.
Each of the products had its own iterative design & development process. They would however all be rolled out together.
The Little Details
We created a set of custom icons for the suite, as well as a series of AR template designs to assist assessors with positioning the vehicle in photographs. The design system was crafted to be extended for each of their existing brands as well as any future brands. We also crafted the MCT Motorsport brand, as this did not exist.