Ironhack’s prework. Challenge 3: Usability Evaluation and Site Redesign
The objective of this challenge is to perform a usability evaluation and redesign of one of the applications that Ironhack proposes -Skyscanner, Tripadvisor or Kayak-
User type.
The chosen user would be a young couple between 20–40 years old, with the following description:
“You and your partner decide to go to a special place next summer. You realize you have both saved enough for the tickets and are planning to save as much as possible for the next 6 months to do this trip. You want to be efficient and have everything you need organized to enjoy at 100% while there. Even if you’re young, you want to have special moments to celebrate being together.”
Research.
The chosen destination is the Great Wall of China, one of the great tourist icons of the country. Due to its vast size, it can be visited in several different ways and in multiple sections. In this case, our couple wants to visit the sector built by the Ming dynasty, the one closest to the capital and the one that is best preserved.
- Nearest airport/most favorable airport to the destination: being such a big country, China has many international airports, but the closest one is the Pekin-Capital International Airport with three terminals and free buses between them.
- Currency and exchange rate: the official currency of Pekin and all of China is called Renminbi (RMB), being its basic unit the Yuan (CNY) and both terms are used indifferently. That is, 5RMB is the same as 5 ¥ (0.60 euro). Approximately, one Euro is equivalent to 9 Yuan.
- Legal requirements: for residents in Spain who wish to stay less than 144 hours (6 days) in China do not need to apply for a visa, in case they are going to stay more than 144 hours they will need as necessary documentation: Electronic passport valid for more than 6 months and fill out an application form and a recent passport-size photo, being delivered to the Chinese Visa Application Service Center in Madrid, either in person or by mail.
- Wardrobe recommendations: Pekin has a continental climate characterized by cold, dry winters and hot, humid summers. The best seasons to travel to Pekin are spring and autumn, since this way the most extreme temperatures and abundant summer rains can be avoided.
- Days needed to visit attraction: taking into account the great extension of The Great Wall it would be quite complicated to determine the number of days necessary to visit the whole route, since it depends on factors such as the condition of each individual, the type of transport that will be used to access each sector, etc. Therefore, it is assumed that our users will choose to stay in China for 10 days.
Benchmarking.
The next step is to perform the heuristic evaluation of the three travel apps, using the Nielsen Usability Principles.
After making the evaluation and comparing the results obtained, we chose Skyscanner because it is the least used application in our country and I think it still has a good way to go before reaching its direct competitors.
Testing.
Then we proceed to test the app with several people who match our user person.
First, they were shown the Skyscanner application for 5 seconds without a previous explanation, after which they were asked the following questions: What did you see? What can this tool do for you? Where would you search for a flight?
After that, they were requested to simulate to book a flight to Pekin for two people and accommodation for the 10 days of the trip.
Insight.
Once both tasks were done, the following problems became apparent:
- The interface at the time of booking the flights was confusing and with too much information.
- They barely noticed the lower menu where information as important as the option to enter our profile is located.
- Practically everyone criticized the fact that there was no option for flight + hotel but that they had to first book one of the two options, which sent them to an external page, pay and then return to the app and book the next one.
- They also unanimously stated that they found unattractive that the information about the COVID was so present.
Redesign Wireframes.
For the redesign of the app we have tried to solve the main problems that arose, first eliminating the menu in the lower area as there were options that were repeated by browsing the application itself so it was redundant and placing the profile in the upper right and also we incorporated the option of flight + hotel that was so requested.
