Joshua Garcia
Joshua Garcia

The Disco Experience

Designing post-purchase ads that don’t get ignored.

We reimagined Disco’s post-purchase experience to help shoppers find brands they wanted. Through testing, engagement grew from 0.3% to over 4%, driving more repeat purchases and sign-ups.

Role:

Led research, experimentation, and end-to-end design

Date:

Sep ’23–Oct ’24

Three phone screens showing the claim flow end to end: a Caraway order confirmation offering 15% off Blueland, the claimed-offer screen with code GETSTARTED15, and the Blueland site where the code is redeemed.

The 0.3% problem

Engagement on the original experience sat at 0.3%. Most shoppers ignored offers.

We set out to make post-purchase moments feel relevant and useful, targeting the 1-2% click-through rates seen on major platforms.

The wrong moment

We ran studies on two questions: why shoppers ignored offers, and what would make offers feel credible and worth claiming. Through prototypes, we tested three approaches: keeping the inline layout, reframing offers as rewards, and simplifying to a single focused offer.

Shoppers weren’t ready to browse right after checkout. Their focus stayed on order confirmation. Familiar brands, clear value, and simple layouts built trust and made offers feel genuine, not distracting.

Inline layout (baseline)

Measured original performance
A True Classic order confirmation with the original “Customers also bought” module: stacked rows of product tiles from Caraway and Milk Bar, each with its own price and offer, competing for attention.

Rewards framing

Rewards, more engagement?
Mobile post-purchase screen for True Classic introducing a $5 reward incentive through Disco. Highlights how ecommerce UX design uses loyalty-driven offers within the confirmation flow to encourage re-engagement and discovery across partner brands.

Single offer focus

Less choice, more engagement?
Mobile post-purchase experience demonstrating an Adidas offer surfaced immediately after order confirmation. Highlights a contextual offer modal designed to capture shopper attention at peak engagement, showcasing conversion-focused ecommerce UX and seamless offer redemption within the checkout flow.
“Most important thing for me is seeing what I actually bought. I want to see where it’s going, my contact info, how much was charged.”
— Q3 study participant

Clarity won

We ran a second study to understand what made offers feel worth claiming. We tested pricing cues, reviews, brand familiarity, and layout variations to see what drove confidence and action.

Clear tone stood out most. Shoppers responded to straightforward language and visual clarity. Reviews built trust. Streamlined layouts reduced effort and made follow-up easier.

Simple offer layout

Simple design, more engagement?
A Bear order confirmation reframed as a reward: “You’ve earned 3 special offers,” with the first, $50 off ettitude bedding, shown as a hero image above four product thumbnails and Claim offer and Next offer buttons.

Brand snapshot

Context builds trust?
The same Bear confirmation with the ettitude offer expanded into Top Products and Reviews tabs, listing a Sateen Sheet Set at $99 and a pillowcase at $25 with star ratings and review counts.

Browse and discover

Choice improves engagement?
A Bear confirmation with the offers arranged as a browsable feed: category tabs for For you, All, Baby, and Body & Beauty above a horizontally scrolling row of brand cards, starting with $50 off ettitude.
“The messaging feels condescending because I know these offers aren’t exclusive to me; they’re offered to anyone who purchases from this store.”
— Q4 study participant

One offer at a time

We built an MVP to test if a cleaner layout and clearer purpose could improve engagement. The original experience felt crowded and passive. Brands wanted more sign-ups.

The redesign focused on one offer at a time, anchored in the shopper’s recent purchase. It drove fewer impressions but delivered higher engagement and more value per visit.

Too much at once

The MVP hit a 2.4% claim rate and 1.17% conversion. The next version aimed to fix its weak points.

But too many updates at once blurred what worked. The lesson: smaller experiments, one variable at a time.

One variable at a time

We shifted to smaller, controlled experiments to pinpoint which changes improved performance. Each iteration tested a single variable while keeping the MVP’s best features. Clearer descriptions and larger calls to action increased clicks. Removing product tiles lifted claim rate from 2.5% to 3.8%.

Clarity and simplicity drove the gains.

Product row added

Best revenue per load lift
The ettitude offer card with a “Your purchase pairs perfectly with” row added below it, showing product tiles from Boy Smells, Blueland, Lunya, and Vitruvi.

Brand descriptions

Highest engagement lift
The ettitude offer card with the brand’s name and tagline, “Eco-luxe bedding & bath that uplifts your home,” set over the hero photo, above three product thumbnails and a $50 off block.

No product tiles

Best claim rate
The same ettitude card with the product thumbnails removed, so the hero photo and brand tagline lead straight into the $50 off block and Claim offer button.

No hero image

Lowest revenue per load
The ettitude card with the hero photo removed, leaving the brand name, tagline, and logo as a text header above three product thumbnails and the $50 off block.

What we didn’t ship

Testing revealed that shoppers valued credibility and transparency in post-purchase moments. We explored ways to build trust, from showing claim counts for social proof to adding ratings and short video for storytelling.

Each concept showed promise but cost more to build. We paused development for leaner tests. They delivered faster insight and laid the groundwork for the core design system.

Social proof

Claims for trust
A Portland Leather order confirmation showing a NEIWAI offer for $10 off, with the line “Claimed by 241 shoppers” beneath the discount as social proof.

Credibility

Ratings for confidence
The same Portland Leather screen with a 4.7 star rating and 9.8k reviews shown under the NEIWAI tagline, in place of the claim count.

Storytelling

Video for immersion
A Bear order confirmation where the ettitude offer leads with a video: a creator sitting on a bed holding a pillow, captioned “I’ve been seeing these ettitude sheets all over Instagram.”

Offer visibility

Browsing for discovery
A Portland Leather screen listing all three offers at once, D.S. & Durga and Koio at 20% off and NEIWAI at $10 off, each row expanding to reveal that brand’s top products.

What worked

This version became the foundation for scaling across brands and platforms. We built a mobile-first flow that reduced friction. Clear hierarchy, tone, and imagery guided action.

By presenting one offer at a time and leading with visuals, the design stayed consistent from claim to follow-up. It hit the highest engagement of any test and laid the groundwork for a system that could scale across formats.

Built to adapt

As the business grew beyond direct-to-consumer brands, scale depended on adaptability, not repetition. Each platform required its own balance of clarity, flexibility, and performance.

Some leaned on brand imagery or full-page immersion, while others simplified for technical constraints. This structured flexibility preserved trust and clarity across partners. The experience scaled with the business.

With brand row

Highest revenue per load
The Blueland offer card, 15% off the next purchase over $100, with a “Your purchase pairs perfectly with” row of product tiles below from Boy Smells, Blueland, Lunya, and Vitruvi.

Full-page takeover

Highest engagement
The Blueland offer presented as a modal over a dimmed Caraway order confirmation, headed “Your order is confirmed” with a close button in the corner.

No hero imagery

Fallback for limitations
The Blueland offer placed inline in a Caraway order confirmation, with the brand name and tagline as a text header above three product thumbnails and the 15% off block.

Other publishers

Flexible across platforms
Mobile in-transit experience concept showing a Caraway $150 off cookware offer surfaced during a delivery tracking moment. Demonstrates contextual ecommerce UX that integrates real-time engagement and conversion opportunities into the on-demand delivery flow.

0.3% to 4%

The original experience crowded shoppers with too many products and little context. The redesign brought focus, guiding attention to what mattered most.

Engagement grew from 0.3% to over 4%. Revenue increased more than fivefold. Shoppers found brands they wanted.

From clutter to clarity

Simpler layout, clearer action.
The old and new layouts side by side: the dense “Customers also bought” grid on the left, a single Blueland offer on the right, annotated with three notes reading why this offer now, strong brand moment, and designed for action.

What grew from it

The redesign became a shared foundation for clarity and scale across design, product, and engineering.

Brand supply and technical scale sat beyond design’s reach. The work still laid the structure for expansion.

Disco reached larger publishers and new markets.

The shipped mobile design: a Caraway order confirmation carrying one Blueland offer, with the brand’s hero image and tagline above 15% off the next purchase over $100.
The same design on desktop, shown on a laptop: the Blueland offer fills the left column while the order summary, a $469.23 cookware set totalling $453.50, sits to the right.

Credits