Nexus Hub
Briefing Centers are spaces where companies can engage with customers, partners, and other stakeholders to share information, make decisions, and build relationships.
In 2016, Nexus provided SaaS briefing center digital product experiences as integrations into other scheduling platforms. In 2020, due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the shift to WFH propelled Nexus to create its own scheduling platform that included content management for their digital product offerings.
In 2016, Nexus provided SaaS briefing center digital product experiences as integrations into other scheduling platforms. In 2020, due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the shift to WFH propelled Nexus to create its own scheduling platform that included content management for their digital product offerings.
All-In-One Platform
The Nexus SaaS digital product experiences include:
• Customer Portal App
• Virtual Warmer
• Welcome Screen
• Room Warmer
• Door Monitor
• Media Channel
These product experiences help enable briefing centers, both large and small, to easily provide feedback, display welcoming content, agenda for the day, customer testimonials, marketing campaigns, and more.
• Customer Portal App
• Virtual Warmer
• Welcome Screen
• Room Warmer
• Door Monitor
• Media Channel
These product experiences help enable briefing centers, both large and small, to easily provide feedback, display welcoming content, agenda for the day, customer testimonials, marketing campaigns, and more.
My Role
I led the design of the user experience and interface from Q2 2019 to Q3 2022, creating wireframes, high-fidelity mockups, prototypes, the brand kit, product layouts, product templates, and animations.
I worked alongside a Creative Director, 2 Business Analysts, and rotating teams of Engineers.
The platform launched in the 2021 at the Fall ABPM (Association of Briefing Program Managers) Conference.
I worked alongside a Creative Director, 2 Business Analysts, and rotating teams of Engineers.
The platform launched in the 2021 at the Fall ABPM (Association of Briefing Program Managers) Conference.
Determining Our Competitive Advantage
I compared core features of four briefing manager scheduling systems: BriefingSource, BriefingEdge, VisitOps, and JiffleNow, which allowed me to prepare for user interviews to understand their specific needs and enabling me to strategize and prioritize the most impactful features to gain a competitive edge.
*VisitOps is only available within the SalesForce platform
Focusing On User Needs
From previous project interactions and interviews, our team determined that the following personas were the core users that will utilize our platform.
Cindy
The Confident Visionary
Global Program Director
Cindy manages multiple centers and oversees the strategy and operations of those centers. She will hardly use the Nexus Hub but is the decision maker we have to impress with features.
Cindy’s primary frustrations center on the challenges of collecting and analyzing metrics to ensure that the briefing program is generating sufficient business to secure funding.
Cindy’s primary frustrations center on the challenges of collecting and analyzing metrics to ensure that the briefing program is generating sufficient business to secure funding.
Marcy
The Multi-Tasker
Briefing Manager
Marcy is one of a handful of briefing managers that work at a specific center. She will use the Nexus Hub daily and frequently throughout the day. She will manage and approve briefing requests, schedule briefings, update topic details, build agendas, strategic messaging, and view analytics for each briefing.
Marcy’s pain points revolve around being able to efficiently perform her tasks
Marcy’s pain points revolve around being able to efficiently perform her tasks
Ted
The Tech Guru
Center Technologist
Tim works at a single center location but may travel to other centers if his expertise is needed. He will ensure that any digital displays in the center are working correctly. Tim also makes sure that any CRM and Office 365 integrations are working correctly.
Tim’s frustrations hinge on his access to the technology implemented, technical support, and security of the platform.
Tim’s frustrations hinge on his access to the technology implemented, technical support, and security of the platform.
Kicking off the Platform
The user that would spend most of their time in the Nexus platform are the Briefing Managers, so we wanted to target the following features to be available at MVP launch:
• Schedule Briefing
• Add Agenda Topics
• Add Attendees
• Send invites to Attendees and Speakers
• Set Styles and Settings for Customer Portal App and Virtual Warmer
Our objective was to deliver a more streamlined, user-friendly interface than our competitors’ solutions, aiming to enable briefing managers to focus and concentrate on their specific tasks with greater ease. We believed that including a responsive mobile interface would provide greater flexibility and convenience that our competitors did not offer.
• Schedule Briefing
• Add Agenda Topics
• Add Attendees
• Send invites to Attendees and Speakers
• Set Styles and Settings for Customer Portal App and Virtual Warmer
Our objective was to deliver a more streamlined, user-friendly interface than our competitors’ solutions, aiming to enable briefing managers to focus and concentrate on their specific tasks with greater ease. We believed that including a responsive mobile interface would provide greater flexibility and convenience that our competitors did not offer.
User Interface
After exploring several frameworks for Nexus’s design system, the creative director and I agreed to utilize Material Design 2 as its foundation. Building on the existing Material Design 2 kit, I designed additional custom components while retaining the overall design language.
Briefings were scheduled old school in Outlook. With the launch of the Nexus portal, we’ve deployed that for our last three client briefings and just the experience so far has been an improvement for ensuring that seamless experience from the original communication, to briefing day, to post-briefing follow-ups with survey. We’re really excited to expand and continue to grow from there.”
Crystal Harris – Executive Briefing Center Specialist at Optiv
Product Experiences
Nexus’s product experiences are the core selling features of the platform. I designed the user experience to allow for style management, content uploading, and playback settings. I also created animatics so that our engineers can reference the type of animations we wanted to implement for all product transitions.
Before it was manual intervention—when we deployed Nexus, that’s going to be time saving. The (Nexus) system is automated, its dynamic, we make a change relative to the agenda or the customer and it auto-pushes the updated information out and that will go across our ten centers without a huge lift there. And be a lot more professional and customized, I love the customized part of it.”
Bonnie Bryce – Director, Strategic Programs at Dell Technologies
Salesforce Integration
Integration with Salesforce is a key feature for briefing programs that would allow account managers to keep track of their requests, opportunities, and active briefings.
Utilizing Salesforce’s Lightning Design System, I created a multi-step request form allowing account managers to directly create a request within Salesforce, a list view to see their upcoming briefings and its status, and an overview page where they can view any updates made to the briefing—like change the agenda and attendee invite status.
Utilizing Salesforce’s Lightning Design System, I created a multi-step request form allowing account managers to directly create a request within Salesforce, a list view to see their upcoming briefings and its status, and an overview page where they can view any updates made to the briefing—like change the agenda and attendee invite status.
Results
Briefing Managers loved how straightforward and easy it was to schedule briefings, the interface was a breath of fresh air for them compared to other systems they have used in the past. They really enjoyed how seamless and hassle-free the product experience integration and data syncing was.
Nexus hosted an event for briefing program managers at Levi’s Stadium after the Spring 2024 ABPM Conference.
Key Learnings
Program Manager
We found that Program Managers utilized our platform sparsely, they would get their reports from Briefing Managers.
Briefing Manager
A catch-all approach to the briefing setup form was a limiting factor for programs that required more flexibility on what details they needed for setup. A highly requested feature was the ability to create custom form fields, which would require big changes to Nexus’ existing data structure.
Tech Specialist
Our initial goal for the Tech Specialist was to allow them set up styles as well as monitor the status of the product experience devices. Over time, we learned that our internal support team would be tasked with setting up the styles and monitor the health of the devices for our clients, the Tech Specialist or Briefing Manager would submit support tickets if any issues arise.
Conclusion
It was a success for smaller briefing centers and larger ones that wanted a streamlined product experience. But was not able to accommodate the larger programs that needed the flexibility in creating their own forms.
In 2022, Nexus opted to acquire one of their competitors, BriefingEdge, in hopes to fill the missing pieces of having a more robust form creating tool and reporting tool.
In 2022, Nexus opted to acquire one of their competitors, BriefingEdge, in hopes to fill the missing pieces of having a more robust form creating tool and reporting tool.