OVERVIEW
Overhauled GiveWP's admin experience by redesigning Donors, Donations, and Subscriptions into unified, insight-focused workflows that improved usability, strengthened product consistency, and significantly accelerated engineering velocity.
PRODUCT
GiveWP
ROLE
Product Designer
DELIVERABLES
Research, UX Audit, UI Design, Prototype, User Testing, Stakeholder Engagement
The Admin Screens Redesign project focused on updating three of the most important operational pages in GiveWP — Donors, Donations, and Subscriptions. These screens had been untouched for 5+ years and were built on legacy patterns that no longer aligned with the product direction introduced by Campaigns.
The goal was to unify the experience across the product, reduce friction, and give fundraisers access to the insights they need without relying on third-party tools.
The old admin experience suffered from three major issues:
Inconsistent Experience Across the Product
The Campaigns feature introduced a modern, structured layout, but the admin pages still felt outdated. It felt like users essentially had to switch between two different products.Lack of Actionable Insights
Donors, donations, and subscriptions displayed raw data with little context. Fundraisers couldn't easily answer certain questions with the data provided.Structural Limitations
The legacy architecture made it difficult to compute meaningful metrics like projected annual value, donor recency, or segmented views. This also slowed down future feature development.
We wanted to solve these pain points while maintaining backward compatibility for existing users and introducing a faster, more intuitive setup for new ones.
Before diving into the redesign, I had to navigate a few core challenges.
Scaling a New Layout Across Legacy Pages: The Campaigns layout worked but scaling it across three structurally different admin pages required careful system thinking.
Old pages used mixed patterns and inconsistent hierarchy
Details pages behaved differently across Donors, Donations, Subscriptions
Subscription sync and notes sections were especially unclear
Unifying Cross-Team Perspectives: These pages had been used for years, and both internal teams and customers had strong opinions. This volume of feedback needed consolidation into a clear direction.
Balancing New Insights With Implementation Constraints: We identified powerful opportunities like donor lifecycle, generosity levels, activity logs, contribution reports, but we couldn't ship everything at once.
I had to prioritize what would deliver immediate value while shaping a scalable foundation.
My approach followed a structured process, keeping teams aligned and validating decisions early.
UX Audit: I began with a detailed audit of the current admin screens, highlighting:
Visual inconsistencies
Scanning issues
Repeated elements (e.g., bulk actions shown twice)
Hard-to-find actions
Non-intuitive table hierarchy
Confusing notes and subscription sync workflows
Research & Insight Gathering: I worked closely with Customer Success, Support, and Marketing to understand real usage patterns and fundraisers' needs.
Key insights included:
Admins rarely use donor dashboards — they need management tools, not donor-facing views
They heavily rely on external systems due to limited insights
They needed advanced filtering (multiple categories, date ranges, statuses, tags)
Subscriptions require better visibility into failed renewals
Notes were confusing — admins wanted clear separation between internal notes and donor-facing emails
Donor data grouping (households, tags) mattered more than expected
Donation scans were slow due to poor hierarchy
These insights directly shaped what we designed and what we deferred.
Prioritization & Deferred Features: As the design matured, we made intentional prioritization decisions. Features like donor lifecycle, generosity levels, advanced tagging workflows, activity logs, and contribution reports were deferred, not because they weren't valuable, but because the foundation needed to ship first.
Screenshot of the design concept for the donor contributions report
Throughout the process, I continued validating design updates with internal teams, recording walkthrough videos, sharing rationale, and iterating quickly. This collaborative approach kept implementation smooth, reduced design QA issues, and aligned all stakeholders around a shared vision.
The final redesign introduced a consistent, insight-driven experience across all admin pages.
Screenshot of the new donor(left), donation(middle) and subscription(right) list view
Insight-Driven Overview Panels: Instead of showing raw data, each page now surfaces meaningful context. For donors, admins can immediately see first and last contribution dates, total amounts, preferred payment methods, and whether the donor is a recurring or one-time giver.
Screenshot of the new donor(left), donation(middle) and subscription(right) list view
For subscriptions, we added clearer renewal states, improved sync visibility, and introduced Project Annual Value, a metric that helps admins understand long-term donor commitment.
Screenshot of the new donor(left), donation(middle) and subscription(right) list view
Donations also received a refreshed details page with clearer hierarchy and visually cleaner status indicators.
Screenshot of the donations overview page(left) and the donation settings(right)
Advanced Multi-Filter System: The filtering system was completely reimagined. The old filter was limited and rigid, making it difficult to perform meaningful segmentation. The new multi-filter system supports combinations of tags, date ranges, amounts, donor types, periods, and statuses — empowering admins to narrow results with accuracy and confidence.
Video of how the new filtering system works
Improved Notes System: The legacy system mixed "public" and "private" notes in a way that confused admins. The redesign separates them: private notes remain internal, and sending an email is a clearly labeled action. This removes ambiguity and prevents accidental donor-facing messages.
Screenshot of the donations overview page with email functionality(left) and private notes(right)
Subscriptions also received a redesigned sync experience. Instead of a text-heavy block that was difficult to scan, the new layout communicates sync status more clearly, helping admins immediately understand what's happening and what action to take.
Screenshot of the old sync subscription details
Screenshot of the new sync subscription details
A redesigned foundation that improved usability, reduced development cost, and unlocked new capabilities.
Consistent, modern experience: Admins now move between Campaigns, Donors, Donations, and Subscriptions without the friction caused by inconsistent layouts.
Insight-driven decision-making: Fundraisers get contextual insights directly on the page, reducing reliance on exports and third-party tools.
Faster implementation: Reusing the Campaigns layout system cut a 4-month development timeline down to roughly 8 weeks.
Clearer workflows: Updated notes, filters, and subscription syncing removed long-standing confusion and gave admins more confidence using the product.
This project reinforced how powerful a strong system foundation can be.
Systems thinking accelerates everything: A shared layout made the redesign faster and reduced design QA significantly.
Not every idea needs to ship immediately: Prioritization allowed the team to deliver value quickly while setting up for long-term improvements.
Cross-functional alignment is essential: Weekly design reviews and engineering check-ins prevented costly changes later.
Engineers are design partners: Understanding technical constraints early led to cleaner solutions and faster implementation.
Insights matter more than data: Fundraisers need context not numbers, and surfacing the right insights transforms workflow efficiency.