This one kind of mixes up everything we’ve seen all along. We have to test and redesign an application.
For this challenge, we are asked to jump into the shoes of a world traveler and to perform usability testing on a booking app.
1-Scenario
My user type is a young female worldtrotter,(18–38 y/o) who want to visit Kilauea Volcano in Hawaii. This person want to meet people and make acquaintances.
She is not stressed about the organization of her trip as long it’s most affordable, adventurous and she have a genuine experience. Her trip is in 6 months (June), she wants to plan in advance to be at ease. She already have the equipment for hiking and doesn’t need to purchase it again.
She will take a flight from Paris to Honolulu before her departure she will exchange currency to stay within budget.
2-Benchmarking & Selection of the app
I’m going to evaluate 3 apps Kayak, Skyscanner and Trip Advisor according to Nielsen’s principles (https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/), I will identify the one that performs better for my user type.
I choose Kayak because the application match with my user (18–38 y/o) who is looking for adventure, the app looks young with vibrant color, it’s easy to use to plan a trip flight + hotel. It will not
3-Usability testing
I target 3 users (18–38 y/o), interview them on the app Kayak. I gave the users 5 seconds to take a look at the home screen of the metasearch I have selected.
Look an feel
After 5 seconds, I cover the screen and ask them:
What did they see? They understood it was an application for booking a flight, a car or hotels for a trip.
What can this tool do for them? Same answer above, planning or booking flights, hotels or car during for a trip
Where would they search for a flight? They all answered by selecting the airplane icon.
My users didn’t have any problems with the app it was simple for them.
Tasks
I ask my users to choose a round trip flight with the same airline for one week in June, and chose services they need (Usb port, WiFi …) and the flight must cost under 1300 euros.
5-INSIGHT
I detected some frictions and pain points from my users who are blocking my users to have happy results.
Results flights
When my users consult their flight they notice that some flights don’t have a service as power outlet, screen on demand… Most of flights will be during the day and they need to be occupied for at least five hours. Some don’t have icons for the services.
In filters, my users couldn’t find the word “Services” or something similar to add what they wanted. After some search on some filters they opened “Qualité”.
Qualité Filter, my users found only “flights with WiFi only”…It’s not totally what they desired on their economy flight.
I will focus on this main point change “qualité” to “services” on the filter, I will start directly after my users have validated their search and chose one filter (same airline).
6-Redesigning Wireframes
So I directly go to sketch to make my wireframe because this pain point don’t ask so much time but next time I will draw my wireframes.
Here the prototype link on Invision: https://invis.io/5SVE5XZZQF4
Conclusion
This last challenge shows us the process to improve an application following problems encountered by users. As a designer we respond to the users’ demand to better enjoy their future experience.
It’s always nice to get opinions and proposals from others, I’ve been in the user’s place now I’m in the designer’s one.