UX for Microsoft Bing

From June 2015 to July 2016, I had the opportunity of being a part of one of the world’s biggest-impact companies as a User Experience Designer. Within Microsoft IDC, I worked in Search Technology Center India (STC-I), and designed experiences for Bing on Mobile and Desktop.

ux UI workflow framework Interaction design illustrations

Snippets from Bing Rewards India

Bing Rewards Beta — India

Bing Rewards is a credit-based product where you can earn rewards for searches on Bing, in the form of discounts, coupons and gift cards. I was the designer for the pilot program in India that was launched in Feb. 2016.

My role: UX Designer, Graphic Designer

I worked on: Workflows, Business Models, UI Design, Features, Illustrations

I worked with:
Sandesh Halarnkar, Senior UX Lead
Swarit Grover, Program Manager
Vivek Sharma, Senior Program Manager
Damodar Alagarasamy, SDE II
Abhishek Gupta, SDE

I learnt: Business Design, Product Framework, End-to-End Development, Redlines and Asset Creation

The primary deliverables included:

Bing Rewards Dashboard

Workflow for Bing Rewards (from Sign Up to Redemption)

Responsive Designs for Mobile and Desktop

The complete UX Workflow for Bing Rewards India

Bing Homepage Quiz

This project involved designing the framework for the Quiz Module, while creating flows for how a user would interact with the experience. The Homepage Quiz went live in April/May 2016, and reported a 14% increase in the number of users who interacted with the Homepage. We worked with multiple teams, including the Bing Editorial Team in Seattle. The design and development effort was run from Hyderabad.

My role: UX Designer

I worked on: Workflows, UI Design, Framework

I worked with:

Ayush Bajaj, UX Lead
Vinay Krishna, Program Manager
Deepak, Senior Software Engineer

I learnt: Product Framework, Bing UI Controls, Front End Development

Framework for the Bing Homepage Quiz

Bing Lite — T20 Cricket World Cup, Framework

The T20 World Cup Experience on Bing was fully designed and developed from IDC, Hyderabad. Utsav Das and Jyoti Mann had designed the Desktop and Mobile experiences, and I assisted with the designs for Bing Lite.

This was one of the most exciting projects at Bing, as I am a passionate cricket fan, and I learnt a lot about how scores and live answers work. We also worked on testing these experiences with users and participated in several research sessions with Khushboo, our Researcher.

My role: UX Designer, UI Designer

I worked on: UI Design for Lite, Framework Controls, Mobile to Lite Conversion

I worked with:
Jyoti Mann, UX Designer
Utsav Das, UX Designer
Saket, Program Manager
Khushboo Hasija, UX Researcher

I learnt:
Bing Lite Framework, UI Controls, Redlines

Bing Lite Tab Framework

Bing Mobile to Lite Conversion: T20 World Cup Experience

Other projects at Microsoft

I worked on several business pitches, mainly with Swarit Grover, and learnt a lot from my conversations and interactions with product managers, partners and team leaders. We often presented to the leadership teams at STC-I, and the cycles of feedback kept us going.

I worked on Bing Places with Business (with Ravindra Saini) where I created illustrations and newsletters. I also designed the entire flow, experience and design for i.connect (with Puneet Singh), a local culture-sharing platform for Microsoft employees.

My key learnings specific to UX Design include understanding team dynamics, presentation techniques, workflow creation, and prototyping.

The culture of creating a balance between design, product and development is something I will take away from my experience at Microsoft. I entered the office space, fully inclined to products from the design point of view, but gradually realised that it is extremely essential to create a synergy and work together with all the different teams of the organisation.

Of course, constant obsession with the user is one rule I’ll never forget.

Thank you Microsoft! You were amazing.

UX for Microsoft Bing

Owner

UX for Microsoft Bing

Tools

Creative Fields