Nicholos Palmer — JUNIOR UX RESEARCHER & DESIGNER | UX OPERATIONS
Web Content Professional | Content Design | Information Architecture | UX Operations

Managing, Strategizing, and Designing Content Experiences That Help People Find, Understand, and Act.

I design and manage digital content experiences that help people find information, complete tasks, and navigate complex products. My background combines web content management, UX research, information architecture, and digital operations. I have conducted usability sessions and interviews, synthesized qualitative feedback, and designed intuitive interfaces. Having worked in both hands-on design and digital operations, I focus on creating accessible, user-centered products while keeping cross-functional teams aligned.

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Nicholos Palmer
Case Studies

Content & UX Design

Contract Role Applause
Wearable Technology

Usability Research Operations at Applause App Quality

Moderated 4–5 daily usability sessions and user interviews evaluating a wearable technology product, achieving a 95% completion rate and synthesizing findings for research and product stakeholders.

Usability Testing Think-Aloud Moderation Qualitative Synthesis
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UX Case Study PackLane
SaaS Design Editor

PackLane Editor Redesign

Led usability research on PackLane's packaging editor: user interviews, a closed card sort, proto-personas, and moderated usability testing surfaced three key friction points and shaped a redesigned editor flow.

User Interviews Card Sorting Usability Testing Prototyping
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UX Case Study Brewed For You
Mobile App Concept

Brewed For You

Interviewed four tea drinkers to uncover pain points around custom blending and delivery, then translated findings into personas, information architecture, and wireframes for a made-to-order tea app.

User Interviews Persona Building Empathy Mapping Wireframing
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MeanPug Agency Design Design Test
UI/UX Design Challenge > Shipped

Designer Test: End-to-End Design Exercise

A design test given by MeanPug Agency, A full-service marketing agency for law firms, walking through problem framing, exploration, and a polished interface solution, presented as an interactive slide deck.

Responsive Landing Page Design Brand Identity Logo Design Prototyping Figma
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Case Studies

Content Management & Strategy

2022 Nuclear Policy Conference - Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

CMS Management, Landing Page Production, Email Marketing

End-to-end web production and email campaign strategy for a leading biennial forum bringing together global experts on arms control, nonproliferation, and nuclear energy.

  • Built and launched UX-informed event landing pages inside a proprietary CMS, integrating the Splash event platform and applying Nielsen Norman landing page principles to drive registrations.
  • Coordinated email campaign strategy across stakeholders, using past campaign data and A/B testing to optimize messaging and drive a 20% increase in RSVPs relative to the previous conference.
Skills: Web production • CMS management • Email marketing • UX design • Campaign analytics

CMS Migration and Redesign - Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

CMS Management, CMS Migrations, Digital Asset Management

Supported a full website redesign and CMS migration, moving the organization from an outdated proprietary CMS to Payload CMS to streamline content production across the web team.

  • Evaluated Contentful, Drupal, and Payload CMS from a content producer perspective, participating in vendor meetings and flagging legacy workflow issues.
  • Archived and organized digital assets in Canto DAM, establishing naming conventions for the new CMS environment.
  • Trained 4 staff members and onboarded 15 communications stakeholders, saving 30 minutes per published research paper.
Skills: CMS evaluation • Content migration • DAM • Training and documentation • Payload CMS
About Me
  • Moderate usability sessions and user interviews, synthesizing qualitative findings into actionable recommendations
  • Build proto-personas, empathy maps, and run card sorts to uncover user mental models
  • Translate research into wireframes, user flows, and prototypes
  • Coordinate cross-functional teams across Design, Product, and Engineering
  • Enforce WCAG accessibility standards across all digital properties

User Research

  • Usability testing
  • User interviews
  • Think-aloud moderation
  • Persona building & empathy mapping
  • Card sorting
  • Qualitative research synthesis

UX & Design

  • Wireframing & prototyping (Figma)
  • Information architecture
  • User flows
  • Accessibility (WCAG)
  • UI style guides

Content & Analytics

  • Content strategy
  • GA4 & Search Console
  • A/B testing
  • Stakeholder communication
  • Technical documentation
Tools & Software

What I Work In

Design

Figma
Balsamiq
Canva
Adobe Photoshop
UI Style Guides

Analytics

GA4
Google Search Console
Hotjar
A/B Testing

Collaboration

Monday.com
Slack
Technical Docs
Results at a Glance

Insight, Grounded in Data

95% completion

Moderated 4–5 daily usability sessions and user interviews for digital products, achieving a 95% session completion rate while surfacing recurring usability pain points.

24% subscription growth

Informed a content and SEO strategy that grew subscriptions 24% in 2023 by grounding decisions in GA4, Search Console, and Hotjar behavior data.

20% RSVP lift

Applied UX research principles to event landing pages and campaign strategy, contributing to a 20% increase in conference RSVPs.

© 2026 Nicholos Palmer
Design Exercise

Designer Test: An End-to-End Design Exercise

A self-contained design challenge showcasing my process from problem framing through a polished UI solution — presented here as an interactive deck.

Format

Interactive Slide Deck

Skills

UI Design, Visual Problem-Solving, Prototyping, Figma

Status

Completed
The Deck

Click through the full walkthrough below

Use the arrows or click through the deck to follow the design process from start to finish.

← Previous Project: Applause App Quality Back to Projects →
© 2026 Nicholos Palmer. All rights reserved.
UX Case Study

Brewed For You: Designing a Custom Tea and Delivery Experience

A mobile app concept addressing a common challenge for tea enthusiasts in urban areas — the ability to create personalized tea blends from a diverse selection of ingredients, with home delivery built in from the start.

Product

Mobile App

Skills

User Interviews, Persona Building, Empathy Mapping, Information Architecture, User Task Flows

Status

In Progress — UI Design & Prototyping, Usability Tests
Problem

A gap in the market for customizable herbal tea delivery

While customers can order tea from mainstream tea shops through popular delivery apps, those who want to build their own made-to-order blends from a wide range of ingredients have very few options.

Going to a coffee shop or grocery store just to get a generic tea blend can be time-consuming — and still doesn't offer real customization.

Research & Discovery

Understanding tea drinkers' pain points

I interviewed four participants to understand their use cases and struggles around building personalized tea blends, covering both what frustrates them and what they enjoy about the process.

Common Challenges

  • Lack of wide selection: Participants felt there weren't enough physical or online options for building custom blends. One noted that mixing in ingredients like orange rind would mean buying each item in bulk just to make a few cups.
  • Difficulty exploring new blends: Without pre-designed templates or guided customization, experimenting from scratch can feel overwhelming.
  • Limited information: In-depth explanations of herbal tea benefits are often missing or too brief, especially on packaging.
  • Time and convenience: Exploring tea shops can be enjoyable, but getting a quality brewed cup quickly and easily isn't always possible.
Sample persona for Brewed For You
Sample persona
Solutions

A mobile app built around customization and delivery

Based on the common pain points across participants, the proposed solution is a mobile app that facilitates tea blending for both casual drinkers and enthusiasts, with potential adoption by tea shops or similar establishments.

  • Customization & personalization: Let customers create made-to-order tea blends from an extensive selection of ingredients, tailored to their preferences.
  • Pre-designed templates: Offer a library of customization templates in one place, accessible to beginners and enthusiasts alike.
  • Delivery service: Include delivery for brewed herbal tea, with dedicated service design to ensure efficiency and satisfaction.
  • Local discovery: Help customers find unique tea blends available at physical locations near them.
Wireframes

From low to high fidelity

Initial wireframes covering the core screens — splash page, login/sign up, delivery address, home screen, checkout, and customization.

Splash screen wireframe
Splash
Login wireframe
Login / Sign up
Delivery address wireframe
Delivery address
Checkout wireframe
Checkout
Home screen wireframe
Home screen
Customization screen wireframe
Customization
Cart wireframe
Cart

The splash screen explores potential branding and tagline placement, with consideration for an early login option. The sign-up flow collects delivery address up front to streamline onboarding and help identify nearby outlets — while still offering an off-ramp for users not ready to share that information. The checkout screen shows cart items alongside a carousel of recommended products above quantity and checkout controls.

Next Phases

What's in progress

UI Design & Prototyping Usability Tests
← Previous Project: PackLane Next Project: Applause App Quality →
© 2026 Nicholos Palmer. All rights reserved.
Contract Role · UX Research

Usability Research for a Wearable Technology Product

As a Usability Moderator with Applause App Quality, I led daily research sessions evaluating a wearable technology product — moderating live usability tests and user interviews to surface friction before it reached end users.

Product

Wearable Technology (device & companion app)

Skills

Usability Testing, User Interviews, Think-Aloud Moderation, Qualitative Synthesis, Cross-functional Reporting

Role

Usability Moderator (Contract) · May 2025 – Oct 2025
Role & Context

Moderating research for a physical + digital product

Applause App Quality partners with companies to run structured usability research on products ahead of and after release. On this engagement, I moderated research for a wearable technology product — meaning sessions had to account for both the physical device (gestures, glances, on-body interaction) and its companion app, rather than a single screen experience.

I led 4–5 sessions a day, one-on-one with participants, using think-aloud moderation to understand how people picked up, set up, and used the device in realistic scenarios.

Approach

What sessions covered

Each session walked participants through core tasks with the device and app together, prompting them to narrate their thinking as they went. Typical areas of focus for wearable products like this one include:

  • Onboarding & pairing: how easily a new user can set up and connect the device to its app
  • Glanceability: whether information on the device's display can be understood in a quick glance
  • Gesture & input accuracy: whether physical controls (taps, swipes, buttons) behave the way users expect
  • Notification relevance: whether alerts feel timely and useful rather than intrusive
Specific product details and session findings are confidential under Applause's client NDA. The above reflects the general research focus areas typical to this engagement, not proprietary results.
Outcomes

Reliable sessions, actionable synthesis

95% Completion Rate

Maintained a 95% session completion rate across daily research sessions, ensuring a steady, reliable stream of usability data for the client's team.

Cross-Stakeholder Synthesis

Synthesized qualitative findings from each session into clear, actionable recommendations shared with research and product stakeholders to inform iterative improvements.

← Previous Project: Brewed For You Back to Projects →
© 2026 Nicholos Palmer. All rights reserved.