How Redesigning a B2B App Boosted Merchant Efficiency and Sales on the 58 Platform

01 Introduction

In the 58 platform ecosystem, we serve not only a large C‑end user base but also B‑end merchants, whose satisfaction is crucial for the platform’s services.

Background

The 商家通 app is the primary high‑frequency touchpoint for merchants conducting business on 58. As product features accumulated, the original layout could no longer support the load, leading to merchant feedback such as “hard to use” and “don’t know the purpose of these features.”

02 Understanding the Current Situation

Before the redesign, we employed multiple research methods to identify merchant groups and problems:

Merchant research – clarified usage scenarios through 2 offline interviews, 5 phone interviews, and an online questionnaire, revealing four core scenarios: posting, marketing, lead acquisition, and communication.

User‑experience mapping – synthesized interview notes and questionnaire data to visualize pain points across interaction nodes.

Front‑line sales interviews – gathered merchant characteristics and needs directly from top sales staff.

APP click‑heatmap analysis – visualized actual merchant behavior, showing a large disparity in feature usage, especially low efficiency on the homepage despite high exposure.

These insights highlighted two main merchant demands: “effectiveness” and “efficiency.”

03 Designing for Core Needs

Guided by the identified focus on efficiency and effectiveness, we restructured the app:

Aggregated the four core scenarios on the homepage to increase visibility and interaction area.

Added a real‑time business‑opportunity push module, which improved same‑day follow‑up rates.

Reordered page elements from high‑frequency urgent tasks at the top to low‑frequency tasks at the bottom.

Integrated the “visitor trace” function into the messaging module, consolidating communication channels.

Flattened filter controls on the “Posts” page for quicker access.

We also merged the “Opportunity Center” with the phone‑book module, replacing the former with a dedicated “Opportunities” page, which significantly raised opportunity follow‑up rates.

04 Improving Visual Communication

To enhance banner effectiveness, we transformed long horizontal banners into vertical, content‑rich modules with clearer copy and actionable buttons, doubling click‑through rates.

We replaced disruptive pop‑up notifications with a non‑blocking notice bar for WeChat push prompts, allowing merchants to respond without interrupting their workflow.

05 Conclusion

Continuous business growth adds features, but B‑end tool design must remain scenario‑driven. While ease of use alone may not decide merchant sign‑up or renewal, clear information delivery, discoverable new services, and smooth daily operations increase merchant stickiness to the 58 platform.