Background
Our task as an innovation team was to develop a portfolio of new ventures across Vistra’s wholesale and retail businesses in order to drive strong market traction and sustainable competitive advantage within 3 years
After an initial round of research, concept ideation and voting from the venture board, the project zeroed in on the problem of energy brokers.
Brokers place themselves between small businesses and energy companies, eating up the margin for Vistra and adding cost without value to the customers.
Energy Bot
OUR SOLUTION
An online exchange that provides pricing, contracting, and enrollment for non-residential energy customers, and is supported by a consortium of REPs
VALUE PROPOSITION
Transparent pricing and simplified contracting for non-residential customers. Enables customers to bypass brokers, perform due diligence, and reduce procurement costs.
The Process
During our product definition research, I was part of a team that interviewed small and medium sized businesses in key geographic locations. I participated in ~15 interviews in Texas, Philadelphia, Chicago and New Jersey and led several.
Product Definition Screens
During our interviews, we showed an early prototype. We talked to many types of businesses about their energy needs. Almost all of them viewed energy as a commodity. If we could provide lower cost, then customers would leave their broker and buy directly through our product.
MVP User Flow
Feature ranking exercises during the interviews helped us prioritize features. At that point, I was able to map the user flow.
UI Design
I led a design team to test and build the features for Energy Bot. We worked directly with an engineering and product team to prioritize features and provide assets for each bi-weekly sprint. We established a cadence to share the designs with our client and team for feedback before they went to engineering. We used the program Zeplin to share our designs with engineering and give them accurate specifications.
Style Guide
To help facilitate a smooth back and forth between design and engineering, the senior designer on the team made a thorough style guide. I worked with her and the engineering team to understand the capabilities of the bootstrap framework so that we could take advantage of existing interface components rather than reinvent them and force engineering to unnecessarily code a custom component.
Results
Energy Bot received $3.8M in funding through its Alpha build and a $5M seed round. It launched into the market in 2016 with nine energy suppliers licensed in six states. Shortly after launched the site had over two thousand unique visitors a day.