New "test-phase" personalization form: Issues (affecting existing products), thoughts, suggestions

[Fiorenzo]

On MS Edge, I came across the new "test-phase" personalization form on customizable pillows of mine. While I like the new approach and look, there are several issues with it in its current state, and some design (and product) realities may not have been taken into consideration. I've only checked it on a desktop so far, and haven't seen it on other products but pillows yet. Please note that these issues are already affecting regular products in the marketplace and may lead to missed sales.

MAIN ISSUES

1. The template text fields miss all their labels, and the customer is editing blindly. This may not be an issue on simple designs, but as soon as you have several options, you're lost. Plus, you make all the designers' efforts to provide informative labels obsolete.
2. Template images can only be chosen by clicking on them in the preview. There is no separate choice in the editing/personalization section showing all available image templates, nor are their labels shown, with potential information for the customers (e.g. suggested image size or type etc) provided by the designer. This makes transparent placeholder images impossible to spot and choose, and on complex designs with small, overlapping, and/or clustered imagery, the only-by-clicking/tipping choice will become a gambling game.

Screeenshots actual/regular vs new personalization form (on 1920 ws & desktop). The green rectangle on the actual form shows the field labeling, the red marking on the new ones shows the blind walkthrough without.

 OTHER THOUGHTS and potential Issues in need for dedicated approach/solving

1. A template field or image can be used multiple times, in multiple/different places (e.g. front + back or on all calendar pages), and in different ways (e.g. flipped or diff. font). This has to be taken into consideration and addressed when setting up the form. As a side note and FYI, this already doesn't work properly in the new image adjustment tool.
2. Design and template elements can be placed on so-called background areas wrapping around the whole product as well as separately on the different faces (e.g. envelopes, gift bags, etc).
3. Suggestion: To keep the field list neat, you can put labels in dropdown areas or small popups showing at hovering/clicking on an icon.
4. Suggestion: Show image template previews (with labels) also on the left side to make them easier to handle, and to make available also invisible or small assets.
5. Nice to have: Give us a dedicated Get Started / Information tool where we can put our dedicated design infos (remarks, tips, etc) and that is shown at the beginning of the form hidden in a collapsing segment or a popup.
6. Note: Some template borders don't show up well on shaped previews.
7. Important: Image adjustments must either be applied on all copies of that template placed on the product, or made to be applied on any duplicate separately. NOTE: This does NOT work correctly on the already existing adjustment tool, in other words, only one element is changed while duplicates aren't. 

Please solve the labeling issue or designers (and you) may lose sales. Thanks!

P.S. If you want more info on the adjustment issues, glad to explain it further, if you plan to address the problem.

Edit: another old/new screenshot:

[Cat]

My designs are nowhere near as complicated as yours, but I do worry about people being able to figure out my wedding save the date calendars without any instructions. The design requires that they enter the design tool to move the heart over the correct date on the calendar, and without the labels, there's no way to instruct them to do so.

[jophb]

I agree, I also think the template labels are a MUST to have included with the new tool.  I'm sure there are thousands of products on here that would have an issue without those. Sometimes 'simplifying' things can go too far. There is a reason there are instructions and warnings on things like shampoo bottles haha.... people need instructions 😂

[Cat]

Honestly, I have mixed feelings about it because instructions can backfire, especially in the TLDR world that we live it. But maybe they could come up with some sort of optional design-wide instructions field that the designer could fill in, and people could click on it for instructions if they wanted them. I don't mean like the labels on every field, I mean one general instructions or notes section that would apply to the whole product. Ideally, it would be something that we could edit without editing the design - like in the "edit details" section so we could easily change it if/when the interface changed - similar to the product description, only designed for instructions and easily available as a popup from the new design form. 

[VivianD117]

but sometimes it is as simple as -- something needs to be All UPPER CASE to work correctly in a space -- and I always specify when that is required (otherwise there may not be enough room underneath for fancy lower case "dangling" letters).  Or instructions for replacing photos -- much easier if they are designated:  Upper Right / Lower left . . .. 

[Fiorenzo]

I like your suggestion of an optional design-wide instruction field that can be updated externally, like tags, descriptions, and the like, and that can be shown in the form on the customer's request via a popup or dropdown. I use a regular (hidden) text template field for that matter - see my GETTING STARTED part in the "old version" heart template shot.

Labels are still helpful, though. There may always be field-specific important info you want to tell your users to grant the best possible outcome. And you may have optional fields in your template. Imagine a request form with a number of fields and no one tells you what they are for and what info you are supposed to submit.

[Windy]

Good suggestions for changes!

[Fiorenzo]

A good example of why proper template fields & imagery handling and labeling matter.
This product could never be properly personalized through the new form.

Important sidenote: The image adjustment tool is buggy, as already mentioned: when you use the same photo on both earrings and you manually adjust the uploaded image via the resp. tool, the duplicate on the second earring won't be affected. This is a technical problem that needs to be addressed.