No contextual signals
Policy changes, regulatory updates and department news directly affected bidding — but Nexizo showed none of it alongside the tender.
Helping bidders decide faster - not just find more tenders.
Bidders had every tender they needed — just not the confidence to act on it. I led the end-to-end redesign of Nexizo around a personalised News Feed that surfaces the sector context users were leaving the platform to find, turning hesitation into decisions and lifting engagement across the product.
OVERVIEW
What is Nexizo?
Nexizo is a B2B SaaS platform that helps SMEs, consultants and procurement teams discover and track government tenders across India. With thousands of tenders published daily across central and state portals, its core value was aggregation — bringing everything into one place.
But users were leaving. They had access to the tenders they needed, yet couldn't confidently decide which ones to pursue. The platform gave them data — not decisions.
PROBLEM STATEMENT
What was happening earlier?
Users discovered tenders on Nexizo but made their actual decisions outside it — relying on Google News, government press releases, industry WhatsApp groups and phone calls to understand the sector before bidding.
Nexizo had the tenders. It didn't have the story around them, so users defaulted to caution and questioned the value of their subscription.
- Google News
- Press releases
- WhatsApp groups
- Phone calls
- No sector context
- Thin subscription value
Confidence gap
"Is this department actively releasing tenders? Are policies changing?" Without answers, users defaulted to caution.
Thin subscription value
Paying for a tender list felt interchangeable with free government portals.
Opportunity
Help users understand the sector context around a tender so they can decide whether to bid — without leaving the platform?
Surface relevant news and policy signals at the right moment in the tender journey — not as a separate section users have to find?
Make the subscription feel irreplaceable by offering intelligence that free portals cannot provide?
Reduce the cognitive load of scanning hundreds of tenders by helping users focus on the ones worth their attention?
CORE USERS
Whom we are designing for
Through initial interviews and platform analytics, I identified two primary user archetypes with meaningfully different needs and mental models.
Tender ConsultantPrimary User
Client load10–30 active clients
PrioritySpeed & accuracy
What's at stakeMissed deadlines, wrong bids
ExperiencePower user
PAIN POINTS
- Spends 2–3 hrs daily on news sites cross-referencing tender context
- No way to know if a department is in a "freeze" or actively releasing
- Can't track client-specific tender history in one view
SME Business OwnerSecondary User
Bidding styleIndependent
PriorityGuidance as much as data
What's at stakeWrong-fit bids, wasted spend
ExperienceNew to tenders
PAIN POINTS
- Doesn't know when sector conditions make bidding more or less viable
- Overwhelmed by volume — no way to prioritise what to read
- Unclear if the platform is worth paying for vs. free government portals
RESEARCH & DISCOVERY
What users actually told us
I conducted 8 user interviews and 3 contextual observation sessions, watching how users moved from tender discovery to the bid/no-bid decision, and analysed drop-off data from product analytics.
8User
interviews
interviews
3Contextual
observations
observations
Key behavioural observations
Users had a news tab, government portal and WhatsApp group open alongside Nexizo during sessions.
Of drop-off happened on the tender detail page — users read it, then left without saving or acting.
More likely to return within 48 hours if they engaged with related news on a tender.
What users said
“I want to know what's happening in this department before I decide to bid. Tender details alone are not enough.”
Tender Consultant, Delhi“Sometimes I find a perfect tender but have no idea if the department is stable. I end up Googling for 20 minutes.”
SME Owner, Mumbai“Subscription value feels similar to just checking the government portal myself.”
Procurement Consultant, Pune“If Nexizo showed me the news alongside the tender, I'd never leave the app.”
Tender Consultant, BangalorePRODUCT GOAL
The research validated that a News Feed could
- Strengthen subscription value
- Improve bidding confidence
- Increase daily engagement
IDEATION
Exploring the right format for context
Iteration 01 was a traditional news section with brief summaries linking to the source. From there we shifted to a feed-based model — letting users continuously scroll through relevant news tailored to their preferences.
Iteration 01 — Static news section
Iteration 02 — Feed exploration
Iteration 03 — Refined feed model
Final Design
Designed a personalised News Feed
Designed the feed to match how each device is used — a single-column scroll for quick mobile browsing, and a multi-story layout on desktop for faster scanning and comparison.
Design Decision
Design decisions that turned aggregation into intelligence
- Shifted from a static news section to a continuously scrollable feed, matching how users actually browse rather than "look something up."
- Personalised the feed around each user's tracked industries, organisations, and tender interests, instead of showing one generic list to everyone.
- Surfaced sector and policy context directly alongside tenders, so bidding confidence no longer depended on leaving the platform to Google it.
- Made the feature exclusive to active subscribers, tying a clear, visible benefit to the paid tier instead of leaving subscription value implicit.
- Linked every news item back to the company and tender it affects, turning a passive read into an actionable next step.
Business Impact
These decisions moved real numbers, not just workflows
28-41%
Engagement & retention lift
18%
Subscription & revenue signals
12-16%
Increased tender engagement rate
Thanks for Reading