Rise Bar Website: A Mediocre and Uncomfortable Experience
The design of Rise Bar’s website is a significantly better experience on the desktop compared to its mobile version. Overall, both versions do convey the purpose of the website and accentuating the differentiating aspect of Rise Bar. It is immediately clear to the visitor that Rise Bar is intended for the adventurous and sporty audience but with significant health benefits due to the fact that it is gluten free, non-GMO, soy free etc. The overall design feels to be clean as there is contrast in color, and each section is well defined using the color contrast. The user is able to easily access relevant information from the standard large button of “Shop Now” in the middle, account and cart information on the top right corner. Most importantly, the most effective aspect of its design has been the short and succinct navigation bar as there are only four additional options for the user to navigate through. Shopping experience is also well managed as the user is provided with a wide variety of different options and filtering to select the one they want.
The responsiveness of the website is mostly up-to-par as the main navigation bar follows the user when they are scrolling down. It is also useful and standard practice for the website to prompt the visitor to sign up to its mailing list with some form of a promotion offer. The problem is the level of persuasiveness because most companies offer a direct discount while Rise Bar is only offering a free shipping. There is a duplication because free shipping is already being granted for U.S orders over $75. It is effective in using testimonies, especially catering to a wide variety of audiences as they include endorsements from Instagram celebrities involved in all types of different sports and activities: from yoga to surfing to weightlifting to the daily fashion model.
However, beyond these aspects of the design, both the desktop website and mobile version have significant flaws in their user-centric experience and design. First, the problem with the desktop website is that it is not responsive in recognizing the size of the browser. Beginning from the very top of the website, there is a cut off on my own screen as it does not fully display the two protein options, which makes it a bit uncomfortable to look at in a very subtle way. The problem with this is that the main focus of the visitor when first entering the website may become lost because there isn’t a clear text for the person to look at. Alternatively, it would be much more effective if it had just cut off at the main picture of the hiker holding a Rise Bar, or its seven main qualities. The other issue with its main page is the cut off the hiker. It is very uncomfortable to look at because it feels that the picture should be a lot larger and is cut off at an unnatural position. This experience is better on the mobile because the picture is a lot narrower, which makes it more pleasurable to look at.
Yet, the mobile version also suffers from user-centric design. Again, it is not responsive because the main picture does not fit the entire screen. Scrolling down the website is the seven features that differentiates Rise Bar from others but it is asymmetrical and thus leaves a large blank space on the bottom right corner. The worst issue with the mobile website is the amount space taken up by the responsive design. The navigation bar and the sign-up button follows the user throughout. The problem with this is that it takes up a lot more space than needs to. On the iPhone-X, the large screen is arguably shortened by 40%, taken up by the navigation and signup button. What is more uncomfortable is that the sign-up button is on the bottom that makes the screen appear to be even smaller. I believe that Rise Bar would seriously need to reconsider a new web-designer to properly manage its website design.
