Summary
The Digital Asset Library serves as the creative hub for internal teams to access and manage brand visuals, ensuring consistency and quality across campaigns worldwide. Adobe AEM redesigned the backend and frontend for the asset library.
I lead the redesign, solved a developmental blocker, and improved the usability
Conducted a UX audit, interviewed users on the library floor, and reduced task time by 50%.
Advanced search was designed with out-of-box AEM components, unblocked the project, and sped up development.
Not only we solved the Search problems, but we also introduced new design theme and new features.
Brainstormed features like Workflow and Lightbox for the product roadmap.
1. The Challenge
Adobe's internal digital asset management system was to replace Ralph Lauren's digital asset library.
The existing portal had a complicated search filter mechanism that could not be accommodated by Adobe's application under project constraints.
The task was to scale the existing solution to meet the requirements of the Digital Asset Library and ease development.
Due to system constraints, I could enhance existing application features to a certain extent to meet requirements but could not introduce new features.
2. My Approach
The Digital Library was used by shop librarians that maintained clothes and garments from 1700's to 2000's.
Fashion designers would request library to see and study cloth pieces
Post root cause analysis, I understood that we need to study how the library is to be used by the employees
I made a short trip to NYC to talk to the team and understand floor mechanics and user personas
I conducted 8 interviews and 1 focus group discussion
Post findings, we understood that users are Overwhelmed by 100+ categories, 600 filter options, lack of filter discoverability, and cart/checkout friction.
3. User personas
To design a solution that truly aligns with user goals and frustrations, we focused on three primary personas—each interacting with the Digital Asset Library in distinct ways. These personas were developed through interviews, FGDs, and usage data analysis - Fashion Designer, Event Manager & Digital Librarian
4. Problem Statement
Core Problem Statement:
“Enable 3 personas—Designers, Event Managers, Digital Librarians—to find, manage, and check out digital assets efficiently within the constraints of Adobe’s DAM integration.”
Personas & Jobs-to-be-Done (JTBD):
Fashion Designers (80% user base): Seek visual inspiration, spend 5–8 hrs/week
Event Managers: Browse asset groups/fabrics, ~1–4 hrs/week
Digital Librarians: Handle check-outs, metadata; 2–4 hrs/day
Usability Findings Summary:
Overwhelmed by 100+ categories, 600 filter options, lack of filter discoverability, and cart/checkout friction.
5. Ideation and Solutions
We used Crazy8 to sketch different ideas. The most voted one was turned into high fidelith by rapid protoype.
Rapid Prototyping
The high-fidelity wireframes focusing on powerful search interactions. Product owner they felt “too flashy and heavy” and would overwhelm users and dev cycles. We iterated on it
UX Law in Play:
Hick’s Law—simplify decision points (filters) to reduce cognitive load.
Jakob’s Law—users expect familiar paradigms (saved searches, A–Z filters).
6. Improved Designs
We used Crazy8 to sketch different ideas. The most voted one was turned into high fidelith by rapid protoype.
Rapid Prototyping
The high-fidelity wireframes focusing on powerful search interactions. Product owner they felt “too flashy and heavy” and would overwhelm users and dev cycles. We iterated on it
UX Law in Play:
Hick’s Law—simplify decision points (filters) to reduce cognitive load.
Jakob’s Law—users expect familiar paradigms (saved searches, A–Z filters).
7. Design highlights
Old application had two main features, Asset search and profile. For revamped RL's Digital library , we added features like Collections, Cart & Checkout, Asset Workflow, and Lightbox (Curated collection+order). The design is flat with Dark blue and gold color palette
Multiple Homepages
We found it best that the three personas landed on their own personalised home pages to optimize work
Search, Collections and Workflow were the 3 main sections for landing pages.
These would be available for all users but the default landing page would change
Event managers —— Collections page
Fashion Designers —— Search paghe
Workflow —— Digital librarian
Search feature optimization
Search consisted of 100+ categories and 600 filter options
We introduced primary and secondary filter levels based on user input.
We introduced saved search, so that commonly applied & preferred filters were already applied
Introduced A-Z filter sorting within the categories
Also we introduced search within the filters for some categories
Asset/Product Page
Enhanced Asset Quick look to include improved zoom in features and previous/next navigation
Metadata could be seen better on web and mobile screens
Brainstormed new features like Workflow for Quick Approvals and Lightbox -
Curated collections to be taken in phase 2
