Seller Verification
Background
Amidst the rapid online marketplace growth during the pandemic in 2020, the state of Arkansas passed a bill that enforced e-commerce marketplaces like IG+FB Shops to verify and disclose seller information for consumer protection. In 2021, the state of Ohio followed with a similar bill, and the US Congress was preparing to pass a similar law at the federal level. To help 10M+ sellers in the US to comply with the law, I worked directly with a legal counsel to design and ship the seller verification flow. The flow successfully launched in two milestones—Arkansas INFORM Act SB470 and the Federal INFORM Consumers Act. The flow also anticipated the upcoming EU regulation, which is scheduled to launch by 2024.
Role
Design Lead
Product Strategy
Team
1 PD
1 CD
1 ENG
1 TPM
1 Legal Counsel
Time
Nov 2020 —
Nov 2022
Audience
Arkansas Sellers
US Sellers
EU+Worldwide Sellers
People Problem
To ensure the trust and safety of e-commerce consumers, government agencies have passed regulations to verify and disclose seller information.
Timeline
Working with an ongoing bill at the state and federal level was challenging as the definition of the bill was a moving target.
Communication
To collect legal information authoritatively, the seller needed a dedicated communication module that reflected various states, such as pre-verified, pending, and verified states.
Phone/Email
Designed and shipped in-house phone number and email address verification flows.
Personal Information
Disclosing personal phone numbers and email addresses was against Meta's privacy policy; allowed sellers to opt out and disclose alternative verified information.
Buyer Experience
Successfully launched the Arkansas INFORM Act compliance program in Q4 2020.
Federal INFORM Consumers Act
Built additional compliance measures on top of the Arkansas INFORM Act work.
New Seller Verification Module
Evolved the verification banner into a permanent widget with an annual re-verification flow.
Verification Status
Added additional verification status required for the Federal INFORM Consumers Act.
New User Experience
Added additional NUX and email campaign that was targeted 3-month before, 1-month before, 3-day before, and 1-day before the compliance deadline.
Additional Forms
Designed and shipped additional information intake around business EIN and supporting document.
The EU+Worldwide
Designed and shipped additional information intake to comply with the EU regulation. The legal counsel's proposal was also to leverage the EU flow and apply it to all sellers worldwide on a voluntary basis.
Additional Intake
Designed and shipped global phone number, email address, physical address, and business ID verification flow.
Business Impact
Successfully launched each compliance program with enough runway in consideration of the deadline.
