Prework Ironhack UX/UI: Usability Evaluation and Site Redesign
By: Roos Candice Van Dijk
Tags: Usability, Evaluation, Redesign

This article contains the third challenge of the prework: a case study based on research, interviews, testing and redesigning to improve future iteration of a website or app.

The scenario

Rick and Tracey have been married for 35 years this year and to celebrate their anniversary, their wish is to make a special journey together. Now that they’re both retired, they finally have the opportunity to visit one of the world’s wonders: Chichén Itzá in Mexico. They’re looking for a tour or package with some flexibility that would allow them to enjoy while not dealing with many processes and desitions on their own. Besides the cultural activities, they want comfort and enough time to relax in between domestic travelings.

Age: 65+

Located: Utrecht, (central of) the Netherlands

The journey

The nearest airport in Mexico would be Cancún, which will only be a few hours drive to Valladolid, a small town where you can visit the Maya temples (the Chichén Itzá). The journey of Rick and Tracey will take approximately 4 weeks. They’re planning to book hotels along the way for their comfort. There is no particular budget, they just want it to be special for their anniversary. When arriving in Mexico, they need 5 days to relax from the flight and acclimatize. From there on they will travel to Valladolid and spend 2 days (3 nights). After that they are flexible and got spare time to fill in free until they return to the Netherlands.

The tool

I compared four travel apps which fits best for a package deal to Mexico from Amsterdam: Skyscanner, Hopper, Kayak and TripAdvisor. Skyscanner and Hopper don’t offer package deals while TripAdvisor does, but not to Mexico. Therefore, the most appropriate tool I believe for Rick and Tracey to book their trip is Kayak. They not only offer flights, hotels and car rentals, but also complete packages for this destination. Furthermore, Kayak has a feature to create your own journey named ‘Trip Builder’, where you can add destinations to your trip. This would give the user type a good overview what their possibilities are to do besides visiting Chichén Itzá, because this would only take them one whole day.

The test

When testing, I interviewed 3 user types like Rick and Tracey, all aged 65+. I used the 5-seconds test when showing the homepage of Kayak, so this could give me information about their first impression of the website.

Kayak’s Homepage

My findings

What I found really interesting is that I misinterpreted the best working tool for this user type. When benchmarking the tools for this generation I was already a few steps beyond in looking for package-deals within their interests, when actually it turns out Kayak isn’t a proper website based on the respondents’s first impression. When they took a look at the homepage in 5 seconds, all three respondents didn’t quite discover the function of Kayak. Besides they assumed the website was something ‘touristic’, they were misleaded by ads, which had nothing to do with booking a journey. Other pain points were small text, small fill-in boxes and too much over-information.

According to Heuristic Evaluation and my findings from the interviews, the following usability disciplines are important for this audience:

- They want the feeling to be in control (having the opportunity to undo and redo their action)

- They need recognition (familiar brands, icons, visuals)

- They need extra confirmation when a task is completed

- They don’t want to be distract by ads or other unnecessary over-information sections (aesthetic and minimalist design)

- They prefer websites above applications

- Google is their best friend when searching for flights/hotels/package deals, so a searching element on the website is a must

When asking the respondents what tool they know for example booking a flight, they were all familiar with Skyscanner when mentioned. TripAdvisor was recognized either, but not for booking hotels. I decided to use both websites as best practices and pimped up Kayak as wished for my user type.

The redesign

When redesigning my lo-fi wireframes I started with the homepage of Kayak and added some buttons. First I added a search button, this lacked in the original design and is necessary for usability. Second I enlarged the font so Kayak’s function would be more clear. I used Skyscanner as an example, because its function is obvious when opening their homepage. Third I replaced the ads and made buttons of information, in this case a button for ‘Trip Builder’.

Once they clicked on TRIP BUILDER they would get the following page below. Here I added some extra buttons to undo or redo their actions. Also, replaced all sections on one page to have more overview.