Challenge#3: Usability Evaluation and Site Redesign
There is a saying in Spanish, “No hay dos sin tres” which means there aren’t two without three, so here I am with my third Ironhack Prework Challenge!
For this challenge I needed to jump into the shoes of a world traveler: research, evaluate, test and redesign.
Based on the mantra I’m not the user of the product I’m creating and evaluating, and in order to empathize with the user’s needs without interfering, I chose a target audience very different from my own: elder retired couple between 60 and 80 years old, looking for a tour or trip package to visit Río de Janeiro with some flexibility.
After browsing and comparing different apps using Usability Heuristics evaluation with Nielsen’s Principles (Kayak, Skyscanner, TripAdvisor and Hopper), I decided that KAYAK was the best option for my target audience; mostly because this platform is the only one with the option Flight + Hotel. TripAdvisor offers this feature as well but none of the searches I have made there, gave any results.
The benchmarking being done, it was time to interview the users. I did the “5 seconds test” with the 3 persons I have interviewed and then asked them to complete 2 tasks I had designed for them:
- Find a flight + hotel package from Barcelona to Rio de Janeiro from February 1st to the 7th with flexible dates, for 2 adults.
- Filter the result:
- 3 stars hotel or more
- Breakfast included
- Airport shuttle to/from the hotel
As opposed to what this report says (i.e: OTAs obtain the majority of mobile reservations and participation in mobile devices and is expected to continue growing), all the people I interviewed confirmed that they prefer to purchase their trips via desktop.
When analyzing the sessions, I detected multiple friction points:
- The title is too long or complex: 3/3 users searched the trip on the home page (car rental) without reading completely the title.
- “Flight + hotel” option is difficult to find: 3/3 users tried to search flights and then hotel when realizing that they were searching for a car. After doing this, they found the “flight + hotel” option.
- “Flexible dates” option is difficult to find: 3/3 users didn’t find the feature.
- Sense of insecurity: 2/3 users said that the web inspired them insecurity. I quote one of them “It looks like a draft, like it’s not finished”. Other 2/3 personas doubted if that was the correct Kayak app.
- Ads: 2/3 were confused about the Ads; they found them annoying.
- Filtering by airport shuttle: only shows one hotel option while there are in fact much more.
- Confirmation button: when hiring the airport shuttle in the last step, 2/3 interviewees didn’t encounter easily the button to complete the purchase.
After summarizing the findings, I decided to improve the first three pain points (hopefully leading to change the 4th point: sense of insecurity), to enhance the user experience:
- The title is too long or complex
- “Flight + hotel” option is difficult to find
- “Flexible dates” option is difficult to find
All three can be found in the home landing page which looks like this:
In order to redesign and improve this pain points, I decided to change some elements of the home page. There is content that leads to the same page (e.g.: Rutas and Explore), so I decided to clean it a bit. I highlighted the booking area and added an image related to the selected field, enlarged the size of the title and made the copy shorter. I also enlarged the logo and added a few details.
Here is a lo-fi wireframe reflecting the suggested changes:
After doing the lo-fi wireframes I decided to see if the changes made any sense, so I designed a mid/hi-fi wireframe of the landing page and the “Vuelo + Hotel” page and asked the same users what they would do.
Of course it was not the same as they were conditioned by the previous interview, but 3/3 realized immediately that they were in a car rental page and changed it to “Vuelo+Hotel”.
As soon as they landed on the “Vuelo + Hotel” page, they all knew exactly what to do, except for 1 user who didn’t select the “flexible dates” option. They all agreed that this time -even if it was just a wireframe- everything was clearer, easier and thrustworthy.
Although challenging, I am glad to haave chosen the “elder couple” target audience. I really empathized with them and I realized how complex it can be to buy a ticket online even if they are used to, and how their logic within the website is different from mine.
Please leave me your thoughts to help me improve ❤
Thank you,
Maru
