Coupon24.

Digital coupons seem straightforward until real-world shopping begins.

Shoppers need to find relevant offers, understand which products qualify, locate participating stores, and redeem savings at checkout.

Behind those interactions, brands and retailers have their own requirements for campaign visibility, redemption rules, account integrity, and operational reliability.

The design challenge was to support these competing needs without passing unnecessary complexity on to shoppers.

My guiding principle: Make the common path effortless. Keep control available when needed.

My Role

I joined Coupon24 as Lead UX/UI Designer, initially working closely with the Product Owner to prepare the consumer experience for public launch.

I led UX and interaction design across core journeys, from early exploration and prototyping through implementation and iteration.

As the product matured, I became increasingly involved in identifying opportunities, proposing new capabilities, and shaping longer-term design initiatives.

The Product Owner retained responsibility for business strategy, prioritization, and approval of major initiatives. My responsibility was to define effective UX approaches and translate product requirements into coherent experiences, in collaboration with engineering and other stakeholders.

Simplifying account access while designing for real-world failures.

The original proof of concept relied on invitation-based email and password access.

For public launch, coupon providers required stronger safeguards against automated registrations and misuse.

After exploring several authentication options, I proposed using the mobile phone number as the primary account identifier.

An early SMS-and-password approach still introduced unnecessary steps. I recommended moving to a unified passwordless flow: users enter their phone number, verify an SMS code, and continue without managing a password or choosing between separate sign-in and registration journeys.

I also proposed Apple or Google Sign-In as an alternative for shoppers uncomfortable providing a phone number. Product stakeholders ultimately prioritized one phone-based method without third-party identity dependencies.

Designing the Recovery Experience

After launch, delayed SMS delivery and unsupported virtual numbers revealed additional challenges.

Working with engineering, I designed a recovery flow with a secondary SMS provider. After an initial waiting period, users could explicitly request another code through the backup provider, followed by a longer resend cooldown.

We also introduced clearer validation feedback, supported SMS autofill, and provided a support form capable of attaching screenshots and application logs.

Design principle: A simple flow is only successful when users can recover from failure.

Helping shoppers find places to redeem coupons, with or without geolocation.

Store Locator was part of Coupon24's initial public release, but location permissions presented a challenge.

When location access was unavailable, a nationwide map provided limited context for someone trying to find a nearby participating store.

I designed two coordinated experiences across the home screen, store map, list view, and coupon details.

With location enabled, shoppers could see nearby locations, compare distances, explore a map or list, and get directions to stores accepting their coupons.

Without location enabled, shoppers could still explore participating retailers, browse broader store listings, and search manually by ZIP code or address.

Instead of blocking access, the interface offered contextual prompts explaining the benefits of location services.

Design principle: Location should improve the experience, not determine whether it works.

Expanding functionality without introducing more complexity.

Product Scanner originally helped shoppers find coupons by scanning product barcodes.

As Coupon24 evolved, retailers requested support for promotional QR codes displayed in stores, while users wanted to add supported printed coupons to their digital wallets.

Rather than introducing separate scanning tools, I designed a universal scanner that recognized supported code types automatically.

A product barcode could reveal saved coupons and available offers. A promotional QR code or supported printed coupon could retrieve its digital counterpart and add it to the user's account.

I also designed the outcomes when no exact product match was available.

The interface could suggest offers for similar products, clearly explain that those offers did not apply to the scanned item, or provide an honest empty state with a route back to offer discovery.

Evolving discovery as commercial requirements changed.

Coupon24's early discovery experience was shaped by partner requirements.

Major brands wanted their promotions displayed within distinct branded environments, leading to partner galleries, individual brand collections, retailer galleries, and featured offers.

This structure supported commercial visibility, but shoppers often needed to navigate through a gallery before reaching individual coupons.

As the product matured, partners became more open to category-led discovery.

I redesigned the Offers experience to bring coupons directly into familiar shopping categories such as Laundry Care, Pet Care, and Health & Wellness.

The evolved interface retained brand browsing while introducing more compact offer cards, search and filtering controls, and flexible ways to explore available promotions.

Category-led discovery shortened the route to individual coupons, while brand browsing remained available for shoppers looking for a specific brand.

Coupon24 evolved from a post-PoC product into a consumer platform serving a substantial shopper audience.

My contribution focused on making core experiences easier to use, more adaptable, and more reliable as the product grew.

What I Learned

Simplicity is often complexity handled somewhere else.

Across these challenges, I learned that product design is not only about creating intuitive screens. It is about finding workable solutions where customer needs, commercial priorities, and technical realities meet.

Make the common path effortless. Keep control available when needed.