Cargill Marketlink

Overview

Context: Marketlink is a tablet application that was launched in 2021 for farm marketers to help farmers manage their portfolio of commodities. It is centered around creating contracts and pricing solutions between the farmer and Cargill, facilitated by the farm marketer. Here, the farmer promises to sell a certain amount of bushels to Cargill at a specific time of year.

Our goal: Enable farm marketers to be more efficient at their jobs, resulting in more business for Cargill.

Role
UX/UI Designer
Design thinking
Discussing requirements
Enhancements to newly launched application
New features from the backlog
Talking with users

Tools
Figma, Sketch, Invision

Timeline
10 months

Problem Statement

How can we...

continue to improve Marketlink for farm marketers to increase the amount of contracts created and decrease the amount of time it takes to create contracts?


ensure farmers get the best prices, maintain a diverse portfolio and not oversell their commodities for agreeing to sell to Cargill?

Goals

  • Create screens that are easily scannable

  • Make screens that can be used on multiple devices and varying locations (outside)

  • Help users recover from errors

  • Create a design system for developers to reference

Constraints

  • Development constraints- lacked a completed design system

  • Limited time & Budget

Research

Initial Design

Farm marketers need a way to show farmers a high-level summary of their investments enabling farmers to make a quick and well-informed choice on what to invest in next.

We heard from user feedback that this screen was helpful to view portfolios at a high level but lacked the ability to:

1. Ensure the farmer wasn’t overselling their commodities

2. Create a contract off this screen

3. See the various accounts that are associated to the main account

High Fidelity

Roadblock 1- Overselling Commodities

Currently, this graph shows only the commodities that are accounted for, no offers that are contingent on the market. Farm marketers need a way to view the accounts that are associated with their main account to ensure they are not overselling their commodities.

Farm marketers are busy with farmers all day so they needed a way to see all of the farmers assets in one place

Solution 1- Overselling Commodities

We included a radio button where farmers can view their grain marketing plan with the associated accounts. Additionally, they can see what accounts are associated by clicking on the info button.

We added an additional field that consists of offers and specifies all the current offers the farmer has. We also added a warning that would appear if the farmer was overselling their commodities as a further visual reference so the user could avoid error.

Roadblock 2- Cannot create contract

Farm marketers need a way to create a contract easily off the grain marketing plan screen.

Solution 2- Cannot create contract

We decided to add a button to create a contract off the GMP screen. The farm marketer can add proposed bushels to the pie chart that can actually turn into a contract. Once the proposed bushels are established, the farm marketer can click create contract. This leads to the create contract flow with the bushel quantity and commodity pre-populated. This will save the farm marketer time as they can show the farmer the visual of their portfolio and add to it without having to exit out of the GMP screen.

Project Highlights

Other Marketlink Screens

Problem

Farm marketers need a way to create contracts for one or more farmers as efficiently as possible to maintain the same price from the Chicago Board of Trade.

Solution

We created the option for farm marketers to enter bulk contracts. Once a farm marketer enters the first contract, they now have the option to create more contract(s) in the same transaction. This contract will be a clone of the first, with bushel quantity being the only field that can be changed. As a result of this change, farm marketers can keep the futures price consistent for farmers and reduce their time spent creating contracts.

Problem

Farm marketers need a way to see and show farmers what CRM (Cargill Risk Management) products are associated with their contracts.

Solution

Since there was currently no way to easily view this without clicking deep into the account, we decided to add a drop-down menu on the main contracts page. Here, farm marketers and farmers can expand to see all the CRM products and their configurations that have been added to a contract. Now farmers and farm marketers can easily scan the main contracts page for this information.

Problem

Farm marketers need a way to change bushel quantity in the middle of the create contract flow to save time from exiting the flow and restarting.

Solution

Originally, the farm marketer could only set bushel quantity on the first screen to create a contract. We received user feedback that throughout the create contract process, farmers may want to change the number of bushels that they sell to Cargill but there was no efficient way without exiting the create contract flow. Additionally, farm marketers could be completing multiple contracts for associated accounts where the bushel quantity changes.

We decided to add a button to the CRM product page where the farm marketer can view and alter bushel count for all the accounts they are making the contract for at the time. This has saved time as the farm marketer does not have to backtrack when bushel quantity changes.

Next Steps

  • Get user feedback

  • Create a way for farmers to set up their own contracts, with farm marketers approving the final step

    • Give the farmer more autonomy over their portfolio

Impact and Lessons

  • Lots of facetime with the clients

  • Lead 2 design calls a week

  • Maintained my own backlog

  • Became point person after my manager left the project after 2 years

  • Lots of practice presenting and eventually leading meetings

  • Create many versions when designing to quickly pivot in client calls