Ollio Sponsorship Management

Sponsorship management made simpler for brands and creators.
Client
Ollio
Role
Product Designer
Team
1 Product Manager
5 Developers
1 Designer
Timeline
September 2024 - January 2025 (5 Months)

Overview

Project Context

Ollio is a B2B sponsorship management platform that connects brands and independent creators through streamlined workflows.

Problem

Brands and creators rely on scattered email threads, shared docs, and inconsistent communication to settle on sponsorship deals—making the process both time-consuming and unorganized.

Goals
Simplifying the process of:
· Creating sponsorship proposals on the brand side
· Reviewing, and accepting deals on the creator side

Solution

A deal-tracking mobile application for creators &
a sponsorship management web dashboard for brands.

For Brands

Proposals Made Simple

· Manage all sponsorships in the format that all marketers have known and love - Excel table
· Track which proposals are pending, viewed, or revised
· Use a deal template to skip repetitive setup and ensure all key terms are included every time.

For Creators
Simplified Proposals, Smarter Actions
· View each proposal in a mobile-friendly layout with clear breakdowns of terms.
· Use quick reply options like “Accept,” “Request changes,” or “Decline” to keep things moving fast.

Research

Stakeholder and User Interviews

I conducted interviews with 2 brand managers and 3 independent creators to understand the current sponsorship workflow and pain points on both sides.

Through these conversations, supported by personas and journey mapping, I uncovered key behavioral patterns that contribute to the time-consuming, fragmented nature of dealmaking—ultimately informing areas for improvement in Ollio’s platform.

Brands

For Creators

Ideation

Ideation Workshop

Based on the user behaviors, pain points, and goals we uncovered, I identified four key opportunity areas and translated them into How Might We prompts to guide the ideation process.

Brands

· How might we help brands reuse past proposals to avoid starting from scratch every time?
· How might we guide brands through adding key deliverables without missing critical info?

Creators
· How might we make it easier for creators to review and respond to proposals on mobile?
· How might we provide quick response options for accepting or revising deals?
To turn insights into features, I led an ideation session with my PM and two engineers.

Using the “How Might We” framework, we ran a modified Crazy 8s to sketch ideas, then prioritized them using an impact-effort matrix—laying the groundwork for key solutions on both the brand and creator sides.

Design

Major Design Decisions

I conducted interviews with 2 brand managers and 3 independent creators to understand the current sponsorship workflow and pain points on both sides.

Through these conversations, supported by personas and journey mapping, I uncovered key behavioral patterns that contribute to the time-consuming, fragmented nature of dealmaking—ultimately informing areas for improvement in Ollio’s platform.

For Brands (Web)

Start From Template

Proposal creation often took longer than it should, with managers searching through old files or rewriting from scratch. Most just wanted a reliable jumping-off point.

Placing a “Start from Template” button next to “New Proposal” gives brands quick access to their most recently used deal format. Showing the last-edited timestamp helps reduce second-guessing and speeds up setup.

Status At A Glance

Without an easy way to track deal progress, teams relied on memory or messy spreadsheets. It was hard to know who accepted, who was pending, and who needed follow-up.

We introduced a color-coded status tag for each deal card.

Dynamic Checklist

Sponsorship managers often worried they were forgetting critical deal info—especially under pressure. A forgotten usage term or deadline could cause major confusion later.

We added a real-time checklist to the proposal form that updates as each section is filled out. This gives brands peace of mind before hitting “Send,” while preventing small oversights from turning into bigger issues.

For Creators (Mobile)

Clearer Terms Up Front

Creators often felt overwhelmed trying to understand exactly what they were agreeing to. Key information like deadlines or content types was buried in paragraphs of text.

We surfaced the most important info—like “Timeline”—at the top of the section in large type. Bold headers help creators understand expectations at a glance.

Visual Status Tracking

Without a central place to view all deal statuses, creators relied on scattered email threads or memory. This led to missed deadlines or confusion around next steps.

We designed a tabbed inbox with clear categories: Incoming, Pending Edits, and Accepted. Each proposal card displays a color-coded status pill, keeping everything organized and visible in one place.

One Tap Responses

Responding to a deal used to mean scrolling through a message, composing a reply, and clarifying minor changes manually. It was unnecessarily slow and repetitive.

To simplify this, we added fixed action buttons—Accept, Request Edits, Decline—anchored at the bottom of the screen. This allows creators to act quickly without scrolling back up, even on mobile.

Iteration

Major Design Improvements

To gather feedback, I conducted 4 user testing sessions with 2 brand managers and 3 session with 2 creators, and make design changes accordingly.

For Brand

Track More Deals in One Glance

The card layout was too space-consuming for busy brand teams. Marketers had to scroll extensively or search manually to track deals, often reverting to external spreadsheets.

The new table view replaces cards with a compact, column-based layout—allowing brands to scan proposal status, creator names, and deadlines all in one place. It aligns with how marketers already think and work.

For Creator

Clarify Deal Status as a Step

The bubble-style tabs we initially used made the proposal inbox feel like filters—not a progress flow. Creators didn’t immediately understand where they were in the deal process.

Switching to line-style tabs reinforces that Incoming, Pending Edits, and Accepted are part of a sequence. It gives creators a clearer sense of progression and helps reduce confusion around next steps.

Reflection

Learnings

Overall, I’m proud of how I identified key workflow pain points and delivered solutions that simplified decision-making on both the brand and creator sides. If I were to revisit this project, I would be more mindful to:

Matching visual patterns to mental models

I realized how important it is to choose interaction patterns that not only look good, but align with how users naturally think about their workflow. Even subtle design choices can either reinforce or disrupt a user’s understanding of a process.

Designing for scale, not just clarity

Some design choices felt clean and intuitive at first, but didn’t hold up when used at scale. I’ve learned to think beyond visual simplicity and consider how layouts perform when there’s more data, more users, and more complexity.