Case Study: A landing page redesign
By: Iwalola Sobowale
Tags: UX Design, Case Study, Web Design, UX, Website

A brief UX case study for Step-Ng

STEP is a Technology company focused on leveraging Technology to build solutions that solve the current challenges common to the everyday African. Their website is here.

In my opinion, the website looks good, visually, and I must commend Step for offering a solution that could certainly go a long way to ease some of the pains being faced by public transport users in Nigeria; particularly in a city like Lagos with a poorly developed transportation system.

I’ll go straight to pointing out the few UX problems I noticed.

Looking at the website welcome page, at first glance, it is not clear to a prospective user what service or purpose the website renders. It says “beat the queue” and prominently displays a drop down bar prompting the user to “buy your next ticket”. Seeing this, I immediately assumed it was a transportation booking site, where users could book a seat for interstate bus travel, for instance.

I had to read the FAQs and watch the instructive video to find out what product Step actually offers. In summary, Step allows users do the following:

1. Buy transport tickets on the go using a USSD code *5100# (so it primarily serves as a payments platform).

2. Access transport loans to pay for their transport fare if they run out of cash on the go.

3. Access micro-insurance to guard against road accidents.

4. Create a Step profile and acquire a Step transport card which will enable users purchase transport tickets faster on the STEP Platform at their service terminals.

In light of this, I have made the following assumptions:

1. The target users are those who regularly use public transport. I have drawn this inference because the platform is primarily USSD and does not require internet connection… although it appears that Step also has a mobile application (unfortunately, I don’t have an android device to download the app, and it’s not available on iOS so I was not able to investigate this further)

2. Step is at its introductory/pre-growth phase in the product lifecycle and thus, would be aiming to acquire as many customers as possible. In view of this, I concluded that the most important thing Step would want a prospective user to do when s/he visits their site is to get the user to register on their platform (creating a “Step profile” via web or by downloading the app.

This is the original

Bearing all this in mind while working on the landing page redesign, I felt it was necessary to have the USSD code *5100# placed prominently on the landing page, so that the first thing a prospective user sees is the USSD code. I then made sure to include a clear and direct Call To Action (CTA) inviting the customer to “Create a Step Profile”, and giving reasons for this by stating that if the user purchases their transport tickets via Step, “they’ll never have to queue again”.

I also added a floating button to the bottom right of the screen inviting the customer to “buy a ticket”, this will enable users purchase a ticket on the website, without being the primary aim of the landing page.

A notable point

When I followed the steps to purchase a ferry ticket (using the drop down bar on the home page), I was asked to input my mobile number, but it appears this amounted to being registered on the website even though it wasn’t actually clearly stated that I was expected to register; this is clearly bad UX, as I was not informed that by simply inputting my phone number to purchase a ticket, my details would be registered on the site.

Solution: Users should be asked whether they would like to purchase the ticket as guests or if they would like to create a profile by saving their details.

Bonus: The welcome email

Another UX problem I encountered is in the welcome email that was sent after I was inadvertently registered on the site. The email simply said:

“Thank you for successfully registering on STEP. You can now buy tickets for ferries, buses and rails.”

While this may (grudgingly) suffice in welcoming the user, it does not do anything to immerse the user or invite them into using the platform.

In my opinion, a better designed welcome email will do the following:

1. Welcome the user and thank him for joining the platform

2. Give a clear CTA inviting the customer to use the platform

3. Offer some incentive for the user to use the product (e.g. a first-time user discount)

4. Reiterate what solutions the platform provides (e.g. by telling the customer how to purchase a Step card where the Step Kiosks are located in his city or give the details of the nearest agent to his location.)

5. State the unique selling point of the product

In all, it is known that a well designed product will either remove a user’s pain or provide pleasure; and in this instance, the pains Step aims to alleviate are:

a. Users being forced to rush to a bus stop in order to beat the queue.

b. Users having to look for change when buying transport tickets

c. Users having to spend a long amount of time queuing to pay for their transport tickets

Kudos to Step for developing a product which promises such positive impact.

Thank you for reading!

P.s. I’m looking for a great product design role where I can put my UX skills to use on a user-centered product. If you feel we might be able to work together on something awesome please shoot me an email via my website.