Michael Estiban Smith
UX & Design Director
Mitre10
A five-year journey from MVP to award-winning ecommerce
Some projects are a brief. This one became a relationship.
Over five years, my work with Mitre 10 grew from a single replatforming project into a long-term, end-to-end redesign of their entire ecommerce experience. What started as an MVP to stabilise and modernise the foundations became a sustained, evidence-driven program of improvement that touched every part of the experience — from homepage to checkout, product discovery to order management.
The work delivered significant, measurable growth across transactions, revenue, and conversion — and formed a key part of Balance's award-winning submission for Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce 2024.
Platform
Adobe Commerce
Role
UX & Design Director
Duration
Data Three
Outcome
Significant, measurable growth across transactions, revenue, and conversion*
*Specific metrics cannot be shared.
The Challenge
Mitre 10 is one of Australia's most recognised hardware retail brands — a complex, franchise-based business with thousands of SKUs, a technically demanding Adobe Commerce platform, and customers ranging from weekend DIYers to trade professionals.
The original platform was functional but fragile. It had been built to get online, not to perform. The opportunity was significant — but so was the complexity.
Discover
I led a comprehensive UX analysis — mapping the full end-to-end journey, identifying friction points, and benchmarking against competitors and best-in-class ecommerce experiences. The investigation revealed far more than surface-level usability issues: fundamental gaps in how the experience supported different customer types, how product information was structured, and how the purchase journey performed across devices. This became the catalyst for a more data-led approach at Mitre 10 — and the foundation for everything that followed.
Define
The findings shaped a clear strategy: incremental, evidence-driven improvements — each grounded in user needs, validated against technical constraints, and sequenced for maximum impact. I worked closely with business analysts to ensure every design decision was grounded in what the Adobe Commerce platform could actually support, and with Mitre 10 stakeholders to align design direction with broader business goals across marketing, offers, and trading strategy.
Design
I led UX and UI design across the entire experience over five years — homepage and navigation, product discovery and search, product detail pages, cart and checkout, order management, account and loyalty, and end-to-end mobile. I worked alongside UI/UX designers on key site sections, providing design direction, hands-on feedback, and quality oversight to ensure consistency and craft across a long-running, multi-workstream engagement.
Outcome
Five-year engagements teach you things a single project never can. The most important lesson: sustained improvement beats big-bang redesign every time. When you combine rigorous discovery, clear hypotheses, and a commitment to incremental evidence-driven change — the results compound. Year on year, the experience got better. And so did the outcomes.
What I learned
Five-year engagements teach you things a single project never can. The most important lesson: sustained improvement beats big-bang redesign every time. When you combine rigorous discovery, clear hypotheses, and a commitment to incremental evidence-driven change — the results compound. Year on year, the experience got better. And so did the outcomes.
About
I'm a UX and design leader with 19 years of hands-on experience — from discovery and research through to interaction design, UI direction, and design systems. I lead from within the work, not above it.
I've spent the last eight years at Balance and Digitas Australia building and leading UX and design capability — growing practice, embedding research, and delivering across some of Australia's most recognised brands. That work contributed to Balance being awarded Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce in 2024, and Digitas Australia taking out the same award the following year.
Let's talk
If you're building a design-led digital practice and need someone who'll get into the work, raise the quality, and help shape where the agency goes next — I'd love to talk.
Get in Touch
Find me on LinkedIn
Mitre10
A five-year journey from MVP to award-winning ecommerce
Some projects are a brief. This one became a relationship.
Over five years, my work with Mitre 10 grew from a single replatforming project into a long-term, end-to-end redesign of their entire ecommerce experience. What started as an MVP to stabilise and modernise the foundations became a sustained, evidence-driven program of improvement that touched every part of the experience — from homepage to checkout, product discovery to order management.
The work delivered significant, measurable growth across transactions, revenue, and conversion — and formed a key part of Balance's award-winning submission for Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce 2024.
Platform
Adobe Commerce
Role
UX & Design Director
Duration
Data Three
Outcome
Significant, measurable growth across transactions, revenue, and conversion*
*Specific metrics cannot be shared.
The Challenge
Mitre 10 is one of Australia's most recognised hardware retail brands — a complex, franchise-based business with thousands of SKUs, a technically demanding Adobe Commerce platform, and customers ranging from weekend DIYers to trade professionals.
The original platform was functional but fragile. It had been built to get online, not to perform. The opportunity was significant — but so was the complexity.
Discover
I led a comprehensive UX analysis — mapping the full end-to-end journey, identifying friction points, and benchmarking against competitors and best-in-class ecommerce experiences. The investigation revealed far more than surface-level usability issues: fundamental gaps in how the experience supported different customer types, how product information was structured, and how the purchase journey performed across devices. This became the catalyst for a more data-led approach at Mitre 10 — and the foundation for everything that followed.
Define
The findings shaped a clear strategy: incremental, evidence-driven improvements — each grounded in user needs, validated against technical constraints, and sequenced for maximum impact. I worked closely with business analysts to ensure every design decision was grounded in what the Adobe Commerce platform could actually support, and with Mitre 10 stakeholders to align design direction with broader business goals across marketing, offers, and trading strategy.
Design
I led UX and UI design across the entire experience over five years — homepage and navigation, product discovery and search, product detail pages, cart and checkout, order management, account and loyalty, and end-to-end mobile. I worked alongside UI/UX designers on key site sections, providing design direction, hands-on feedback, and quality oversight to ensure consistency and craft across a long-running, multi-workstream engagement.
Outcome
The UX-driven improvements contributed to a wider ecommerce strategy that also included marketing, offers, and platform investment. The engagement delivered significant, sustained growth across every key ecommerce metric — and demonstrated what's possible when rigorous UX practice is embedded into a long-term client relationship.
The work formed a central part of Balance's submission for Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce — which we won in 2024.
What I learned
Five-year engagements teach you things a single project never can. The most important lesson: sustained improvement beats big-bang redesign every time. When you combine rigorous discovery, clear hypotheses, and a commitment to incremental evidence-driven change — the results compound. Year on year, the experience got better. And so did the outcomes.
About
I'm a UX and design leader with 19 years of hands-on experience — from discovery and research through to interaction design, UI direction, and design systems. I lead from within the work, not above it.
I've spent the last eight years at Balance and Digitas Australia building and leading UX and design capability — growing practice, embedding research, and delivering across some of Australia's most recognised brands. That work contributed to Balance being awarded Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce in 2024, and Digitas Australia taking out the same award the following year.
Let's talk
If you're building a design-led digital practice and need someone who'll get into the work, raise the quality, and help shape where the agency goes next — I'd love to talk.
Get in Touch
Find me on LinkedIn
Mitre10
A five-year journey from MVP to award-winning ecommerce
Some projects are a brief. This one became a relationship.
Over five years, my work with Mitre 10 grew from a single replatforming project into a long-term, end-to-end redesign of their entire ecommerce experience. What started as an MVP to stabilise and modernise the foundations became a sustained, evidence-driven program of improvement that touched every part of the experience — from homepage to checkout, product discovery to order management.
The work delivered significant, measurable growth across transactions, revenue, and conversion — and formed a key part of Balance's award-winning submission for Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce 2024.
Platform
Adobe Commerce
Role
UX & Design Director
Duration
5 years
Outcome
Significant, measurable growth across transactions, revenue, and conversion*
*Specific metrics cannot be shared.
The Challenge
Mitre 10 is one of Australia's most recognised hardware retail brands — a complex, franchise-based business with thousands of SKUs, a technically demanding Adobe Commerce platform, and customers ranging from weekend DIYers to trade professionals.
The original platform was functional but fragile. It had been built to get online, not to perform. The opportunity was significant — but so was the complexity.
Discover
I led a comprehensive UX analysis — mapping the full end-to-end journey, identifying friction points, and benchmarking against competitors and best-in-class ecommerce experiences. The investigation revealed far more than surface-level usability issues: fundamental gaps in how the experience supported different customer types, how product information was structured, and how the purchase journey performed across devices. This became the catalyst for a more data-led approach at Mitre 10 — and the foundation for everything that followed.
Define
The findings shaped a clear strategy: incremental, evidence-driven improvements — each grounded in user needs, validated against technical constraints, and sequenced for maximum impact. I worked closely with business analysts to ensure every design decision was grounded in what the Adobe Commerce platform could actually support, and with Mitre 10 stakeholders to align design direction with broader business goals across marketing, offers, and trading strategy.
Design
I led UX and UI design across the entire experience over five years — homepage and navigation, product discovery and search, product detail pages, cart and checkout, order management, account and loyalty, and end-to-end mobile. I worked alongside UI/UX designers on key site sections, providing design direction, hands-on feedback, and quality oversight to ensure consistency and craft across a long-running, multi-workstream engagement.
Outcome
The UX-driven improvements contributed to a wider ecommerce strategy that also included marketing, offers, and platform investment. The engagement delivered significant, sustained growth across every key ecommerce metric — and demonstrated what's possible when rigorous UX practice is embedded into a long-term client relationship.
The work formed a central part of Balance's submission for Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce — which we won in 2024.
What I learned
Five-year engagements teach you things a single project never can. The most important lesson: sustained improvement beats big-bang redesign every time. When you combine rigorous discovery, clear hypotheses, and a commitment to incremental evidence-driven change — the results compound. Year on year, the experience got better. And so did the outcomes.
About
I'm a UX and design leader with 19 years of hands-on experience — from discovery and research through to interaction design, UI direction, and design systems. I lead from within the work, not above it.
I've spent the last eight years at Balance and Digitas Australia building and leading UX and design capability — growing practice, embedding research, and delivering across some of Australia's most recognised brands. That work contributed to Balance being awarded Campaign Agency of the Year in eCommerce in 2024, and Digitas Australia taking out the same award the following year.
Let's talk
If you're building a design-led digital practice and need someone who'll get into the work, raise the quality, and help shape where the agency goes next — I'd love to talk.
Get in Touch
Find me on LinkedIn