I've conducted user research in emerging countries. My ethnography work has focused on how cultural beliefs influence people's interaction with technology.
Words
I began my career journey as a tv news reporter. For years, I interviewed people from all walks and told their stories. This experience has given me a deep sense of communication as key to joyful user experiences. Beautiful UI isn't enough. You must also have beautiful messaging.
Wanderer
I've lived in 4 countries, traveled to many more, and speak Arabic. From living in the jungles of Thailand to the deserts of Oman, my worldview has shaped my perspective on design and how I create user experiences.
Pinterest: Personas. New Feature Creation. Wireframes. Prototypes.
App Redesign
SpotOn Part 2: Personas. Usability Test. New Feature Creation. Wireframes.
App Creation
Tights or Scarves: Passion Project. App Creation, Design & Development.
Design Recommendations
Vint: Usability Test. User Flow. Design Recommendations.
User Research Projects
User Research
Ethnography In The Middle East Part 1: Ethnographic Analysis. Personas. Usability Tests.
User Research
Dell's Solar Powered Classroom: Ethonography. Personas. Usability Tests.
Contact
Drop me a line. I'd love to connect!
StyleLend App
When I moved to San Francisco, I did so with half a closet. Mainly because I moved into an apartment with a closet the size of a hamster. It was great for simplifying but I often found myself without the right outfit for the right occasion. Enter Rent the Runway, a platform for renting designer dresses for any occasion– from date night to weddings.
Inspiration
I used Rent the Runway many times until I heard about Style Lend, a startup with a similar concept except hyper local. I’ve used Style Lend a few times and while I enjoyed the experience, I wished for an app to make the rental process even faster and more streamlined. So, I decided to create an iOS app.*
Persona
I began by thinking about the user:
Julie is 28, lives in Soma and attends special events (like a cocktail party or wedding) once a month. Her closet space is sparse and she loves a good deal. She likes that Style Lend is less expensive than Rent the Runway and local, so she can rent a dress the day before an event.
Julie sometimes makes purchases on mobile. She would make purchases more often but will turn to desktop if the checkout process requires numerous fields.
App Flow
Let’s begin with the first screens. After signing in, Julie can choose from curated (seasonal) collections and browse dresses.
She can favorite dresses to view later or continue shopping.
It was important to me to add multiple dress views and the ability to view dress details on one screen.
Next, Julie can customize her rental, a feature that I wanted to make was available at any point during the process.
When it came to designing the checkout process, I kept things very simple.
Unnecessary information (email, phone number) is not needed during this process- those are pieces of information that can be garnered from account settings. Instead, I focused on including only the necessary pieces of information to create a checkout process that is no more than two screens.
Once Julie has rented her dress, she can immediately track the order or edit it once again (perhaps she changes her mind).
When Julie opens the app back up, a status message tells her where her dress is. If she clicks on the chevron on the top righthand corner, it will take her to a deep link that tracks her dress delivery.
Summary
My goal for this app was to create a simple, clean, fashion-forward experience that enables users to browse and rent dresses on their phone. By focusing on only the necessary bits of information, I aimed to create an experience that users could follow through quickly and joyfully. After all, Style Lend is all about providing the perfect outfit. That certainly calls for a joyful app.
For a few years, I lived and worked in the Middle East, developing a user strategy for a small startup. Much of my job was to study how cultural beliefs impact business decision-making and public speaking.
Here’s where I lived! The lovely city of Muscat in Oman.
It was a fascinating time and shaped much of my understanding of how culture impacts how you use and interpret technology.
Entering the Desert
When I first moved to Oman (this little jewel of a country), the startup I worked for was still in beta. They had an idea but no real idea of if it would work. More importantly, there wasn’t yet an understanding of if people even wanted what we had to offer.
Because we were entering a new landscape and vastly different culture, it was important for me to understand the cultural ties behind decision-making.
So the first thing I did? I sat in on business meetings.
Business Later. Coffee Now.
Here’s a tip: if you want to fail at doing business in the Middle East, rush into meetings and get down to business straight away. The plucky expat who tries to talk about business immediately misses a very important aspect of the culture: trust.
Business meetings begin with asking about family and health. This is to establish/reiterate the need for trust of the individual (as family) in order to do business.
In my research I found that trust is garnered over family settings like breaking bread and drinking coffee. Business becomes more trusted only after the businessperson becomes like family.
It is not enough to trust the company. Trust begins first with the individual. Taking coffee is extending an olive branch.
Honor & Shame
The honor/shame culture present in the Middle East is present in every facet of life, including business. My ethnographic studies found that the biggest way one could break the trust they’ve established in a business relationship is to bring shame upon someone.
I experienced this first-hand early on after scolding a client for sending a contract in late. What was acceptable in American business could break relationships in Oman.
In Omani culture, problems are talked around versus talked about. This lessens the chance that someone might shame a business associate by pointing out conflict.
The concept simplified.
Creating The Persona
After several weeks of research, it came time to create personas for the company we were building. Here’s one of the personas that I created:
This is one of 10 personas created within the first few weeks of research.
Conclusion
Studying the Omani people helped me map and understand the complexities behind decision making in business and the people who would use our product. This in turn helped our company target the right group of people and create a product that they needed.
Stay tuned for Part 2 as I explain how I addressed usability studies in gender-conscious environments.
On any given day, you could wakeup warm and sunny at home and work and arrive at work to be greeted by cold and fog. It’s just part of life in the Bay.
So it can be frustrating to know how to dress among many different climates.
After moving from Austin to San Francisco, I would joke with my fiancée that I didn’t know whether to wear tights, scarves or both each day. Inevitably, I would dress for one climate and not the other. Oh, the layering.
This joke led me to create my first app: Tights or Scarves.
The first thing I did was whiteboard out the app- from the design stories, through task flow and UI sketches.
If you’re not familiar with whiteboarding, check out this awesome Medium article about the process.
Whiteboarding Out the App
I also did an exercise called six-ups, which challenges you to think of six different designs for one task. It allowed me to take a step back and think of less conventional, more creative ways of presenting information in my app. It also gave me design options to chose from.
Here’s how it works. We ask you how you dress in different weather and what neighborhoods you live and work in. We then take your dress preferences and using a weather API, suggest clothing based upon the weather forecast and customized to each neighborhood.
A Few Screens
Everyday you open your app and depending on the weather forecast, Tights or Scarves shows you whether you’ll need tights, scarves, a coat and a few quirky suggestions to keep the experience delightful.
The premise is simple and hopefully will make dressing for SF weather easier and way more fun.
If you have an Andriod and would like to try it out, you can download it here.
This is an early build. It will be in the Play Store soon.
SpotOn Part 2: Finding A Parking Spot
SpotOn is a new startup that helps marry frustrated drivers looking for parking with people who have driveways not always. Example: I only use my driveway in the evenings. With SpotOn, I can list the spot and rent it out for X amount of money hourly or monthly. If I’m a driver and have been searching for parking for the past hour, I can see an available spot near me thanks to SpotOn.
SpotOn has two site experiences: Listers & Parkers.
In Part 1, I shared how we helped SpotOn redesign the listers site. Now, I’ll show you how we redesigned the parkers site.
Opportunity
After redesiging the Lister’s site, SpotOn approached us to redesign the Parker’s site. They knew the site did not offer the best user experience and wanted help identifying the pain points.
Process
After discussing tasks and goals, we created a usability guide, recruited users who fit the personal and took them through a predetermined set of tasks, noting patterns and pain points. After creating an opportunity matrix, we offered design recommendations and next steps.
Pain Points
We categorized each pain point as one of discoverability, information input, user orientation and feedback.
Each red dot represents a user’s pain point
Usability Analysis & Design Recommendations
Landing Page Pain Points
Design Recommendations
Spot Availability Page Pain Points
Design Recommendations
Parker’s Registration Page Pain Points
Design Recommendations
Quick Wins
We recommended the following quick win because it required little resources and could be implemented quickly.
Conclusion & Next Steps
Our analysis found that most issues lie within the ‘Spot Availability’ and ‘Vehicle Registration’ page. We recommended that SpotOn Parking focus efforts on discoverability of spots and times and the input of account information.
SpotOn will be implementing these recommendations over time and I’ll keep you updated as they move forward!
Click here for Part 1 of my work with SpotOn’s Listers page.
Together10: Messaging & A/B Testing
Together10 is a beta site that sends parents daily, quick lessons to explore with their children. It’s a service created with the busy parent in mind. Each lesson takes 10 minutes or less to complete and is designed around what Together10 calls the “Together10 Advantage.”
Opportunity
Together10 wanted to test the messaging clarity of its site before launching out of beta. They turned to Tradecraft for help creating a usability guide to test user experience and recommendations on redesign and A/B testing.
Process
After getting to know the product, we designed and conducted tests with users that fit the Together10 profile (busy, working parents). We focused the usability test on Together10’s homepage. After analyzing the tests, noting patterns and pain points, we created design recommendations for A/B testing and next steps for Together10.
Feedback & Pain Points
Here are some of the insights we received from the usability tests.
Some users were confused by the phone and thought Together10 was an app (it’s not- yet)
As users scroll down the page, their confusion over Together10’s purpose was reflected most in this section.
Design Recommendations
Longterm Change
Our longterm option is an overall restructuring of the homepage. We create a wireframe that highlights this change.
The redesign addresses user feedback and is aimed at clarifying how Together10 works.
Highlights a clear value statement below the call to action [“Sign Up”].
Includes testimonies from users to reiterate quality.
Includes a video showcasing how Together10 works.
Tabs convey their purpose more clearly.
“Log In” to create a profile and connect with the community.
Quick Wins
Of course, most startups don’t have the time or resources to do a complete redesign. As a second option (one that could be shipped quickly), we recommended several small, quick changes.
Here’s an example of one suggested quick win.
Conculusions & Next Steps
We recommended that Together10 implement our designs and run an A/B test via Optimizely. After analyzing results from an A/B test, we also recommended that they establish a brand identity and language that carries throughout the Together10 page.
Together10 will be implementing these changes in the coming weeks and my next step is to design an onboarding flow.
SpotOn Part 1: Listing A Spot
SpotOn is a new startup that helps marry frustrated drivers looking for parking with people who have driveways not always. Example: I only use my driveway in the evenings. With SpotOn, I can list the spot and rent it out for X amount of money hourly or monthly. If I’m a driver and have been searching for parking for the past hour, I can see an available spot near me thanks to SpotOn.
If you live in San Francisco (or any big city) you can imagine how a service like this could be a lifesaver for city dwellers.
Opportunity
SpotOn has two site experiences: Listers & Parkers. They wanted to tackle the Listers side first.
They built a prototype and wanted to validate the design before shipping. Tradecraft came onboard to help.
Reviewing The Prototype
Process
After getting to know the SpotOn product and design
stories, we created a usability guide and performed usability tests with users fitting the SpotOn persona. This involved taking them through a predetermined
list of tasks and observing their reaction to and interactions for each task. We then analyzed the user
tests, noting patterns and pain points. We categorized each issue as one of discoverability,
information input/editing, user orientation or feedback. Based upon this matrix, we created design
recommendations, quick wins and recommended next steps for SpotOn Parking.
Pain Points
We analyzed the user tests, noting patterns and pain points. Each issue can be categorized as one of discoverability, information input/editing, user orientation or feedback.
Each red dot represents a user’s pain point
Usability Analysis & Design Recommendations
Landing Page Pain Points
This is what the site used to look like
Design Recommendations
Minimal changes to create an optimal user experience. Overall, the landing page was a quick win.
Implemented Changes
Now, users have a clearer understanding of the different spot types.
Lister’s Registration Page Pain Points
Once a user decides they want to list a spot, they have to create a profile. Here’s what our usability test showed users thought of the process.
We found that users had the most issues with creating a spot profile.
Design Recommendations
Implemented Changes
The information box lets users know immediately what they will need to create their profile.
Here, you can that SpotOn implemented our recommendations for simplifying the process.
Users can easily block off dates for spot availability.
Conclusion & Next Steps
Our analysis found that most issues lie within the ‘Listers Registration’ page. We recommended a new form that will help users more easily navigate this page.
Beyond this recommendation, SpotOn also implemented our recommendations for quick wins.
Click here for Part 2 of my work with SpotOn’s Parkers page.
Pinterest: Persona to Prototype
Pinterest is a website and mobile app that allows users to create visual bookmarks of everything ranging from meals to wedding inspiration to home decor. After launching in the first prototype in 2010, Pinterest has become so popular that “pinning” something is now woven into modern lexicon. But sometimes it can be hard to filter through pins on your main feed and find content that you’re truly interested in.
You currate your main feed by following pinners you like. Currently, there is no way to currate your main feed further by searching and displaying a certain cateogory from the pins of people you follow. Instead, Pinterest pulls in all pins from their entire network.
For example, you cannot filter your main feed to display only home decor-related pins from your pinners.
As a solution, I created a filter feature that allows you to filter your main feed by category.
To give you a better idea, here’s a video of the prototype I created.
Purpose
The purpose of the filter button is to display content within a set of specific criteria. This feature will shape the content you see into pins that are most helpful to you. Say you are looking for inspiration for home decor. You may now find inspiration faster because your main feed has become more dynamic and impactful through being able to filter the pins you are seeing.
In order to create this feature, I first began with a persona: hard-working mom Alee. She’s a busy stay-at-home mom with an 8 month old baby and is redecorating her home room by room.
Alee loves DIY projects and turns to Pinterest for inspiration. She curates the content on her Pinterest feed by following “pinners” that reflect a similar style as Alee’s. Even so, her main feed is a mixture of pins ranging from various categories. This is not always helpful, especially when Alee scrolls through her main feed while on mobile.
Alee wants to be able to see specific categories of pins that pinners she follows have shared. With this function, Alee can take her curated content and curate it further, creating a main feed that features only those categories she’s interested in.
Alee’s Persona
Process
After rounding out my persona to include richer behavioral and needs insights, I created the design stories and task flows. This influenced the wire frames and prototype that I was then able to create. Let’s take a look at these different components.
Design Stories
This feature will allow Alee to:
filter her feed by category
select a category to view
view her main feed based on a preset category
add a filter to her feed
remove a filter from her feed
find a pin based on her category preference
(and with much more ease), “Heart” and/or “Pin” a pin she likes
Task Flow
Alee’s motive for using Pinterest is to reference pins she likes. I decided that she would most likely either “heart” a pin or “pin” a pin to one of her DIY boards. Thus, my task flow shows her journey with Pinterest ending in either of these two actions.
UI Sketches
One thing I learned during this part of the process was that the categories needed to be a pop up box, as opposed to a separate window. Sketching out 6 different ways to display categories helped clarify that this was the more effective route.
Wireframes (and a few fun surprises)
After creating my wireframes, I did a short usability study with a few people and noticed something immediately: the filter button was confusing.
I had used the filter icon that’s part of Andriod design convention. However, the feedback I received was that users thought the button was meant to sort content….not choose a category. Uh oh!
Does this filter or sort?
At first, I thought to use the same categories icon that Pinterest has on its site. However, this icon on mobile can be confusing. After looking at how other Android apps displayed their filter button, I used Fitmob as inspiration.
It’s simple and direct. There’s no doubting what this button does.
My wireframes will help explain:
Prototype
My prototype will help give you a taste at how this feature would work.
Learnings & Next Steps
As I worked through the process of creating this feature, I learned that the most obvious answer isn’t always the best one (see the filter icon dilemma above). Like Jesse James Garrett cautions in his book The Elements of User Experience, my filter feature does create a few edge cases.
For example: lets say Alee chooses the Cars & Motorcycles category and none of the pinners she follows have users this category of content. What message would she see? Or while Pinterest has ‘Recent Categories,’ would it be of value to also include the ability to preset a list of categories?
These are both questions that have cropped up because of my feature. My next steps would include working through these edge cases and creating the best solution.
I am also not convinced that the current filter button is the best way to represent the button’s functionality. There could be other icons that also communicate the intent, while staying in line with the Pinterest look and feel. I would want to explore this further.
Summary
While the filter button helps users curate their content, I believe that there’s much more to explore. This one feature only scratched the surface. So stay tuned for more. This story is certainly not over.
I do not work for Pinterest. I just love the app and owe most of my homemade dinners to Pinterest inspiration.
Vint: A Usability Study
My wedding is 4 months away, about the time when brides start panicking about things like invitations, caterers and the fit of their wedding dress. Me, I’m more concerned about the last issue– my wedding dress (and fitting nicely into it).
That concern is largely want made new fitness app Vint catch my eye last week. Vint touts itself as a “peer to peer fitness marketplace.” I was drawn to the app because of the ability to book a personal trainer in my area for less than what I would have to pay for in a gym. Since my exercise choices are largely based on time (early mornings) and location, I was excited about Vint and what it could do to help me reach my wedding fitness goal.
Now to be honest, my first few interactions with the app were a bit frustrating. It took me several attempts to find and successfully book a trainer. So in the vein of improvement (and because I want Vint to succeed), I decided to focus a guerrilla usability study on this app.
Platform: Android HTC
Problem: I use Vint to locate and book personal trainers in my area for early morning training sessions. I’ve had some trouble successfully finding and booking a trainer and wanted to test and see if other people had the same issues.
Users: I targeted my local Laundromat (captive audience), my Lyft driver Paul and the nice people at Workshop Café. In total, I interviewed 6 people and recorded my time with them. You can view the videos here.
I began by asking them the following filter questions:
You’ve been given $500 for a personal trainer. How would you go about finding one?
Have you used a personal trainer?
What do you look for in a personal trainer? Tell me about price, type and location.
What was the process of finding a personal trainer process like?
If you haven’t used a personal trainer, are you interested in getting one?
Tell me about why you haven’t used a personal trainer before.
Tasks: I then asked users to complete 4 common tasks that I do most often within the app:
Find an instructor
Book a session
Request a new session time
Cancel a session
Analysis: While every user experienced some specific difficulty with the app, there were 3 pain points that stood out as causing users the most frustration.
Pain Point #1: Canceling a Session
“I don’t know, I really don’t know.” –Paul
This is a pain point that I am intimately familiar with. The first time I used Vint, I accidentally booked a session and could not find how to cancel it. As I found from talking to users, I am not the only one who had trouble with this task.
To cancel a session, you must visit your profile page to view and cancel your bookings. Two of the users gave up during this task, not ever making it to the profile page. They shared with me that they would have contacted the trainer directly to cancel. Two other users who gave up on the task said that it was “just not possible to cancel a session.” Only one user was able to find and cancel a session without visiting other pages first in search of their booking.
“I’d rather something be in this first page than have to go back to my profile.” –Lisa
My Recommendation: One of my users referenced what she called her favorite app- Urban Sitter. She said she would have liked to see Vint display recent bookings (with a cancel option) on the main page.
(One fun bug we found was with the booking procces itself. After booking, error message would pop up saying that the booking was not successful. This caused users to try a second time, which produced no error message. Even though they received an error message, the first booking had gone through, which means users were stuck with two bookings. I’ve contacted Vint and they’ve since fixed the bug.)
Pain Point #2: Hard to notice categorization
“It’s not giving me a lot of information.” –Oscar
None of the users I spoke with noticed the exercise categories, dates and times at the bottom of each instructors picture on the main page. Three users remarked how they wished there were categories but none noticed the categorization that was present.
Pain Point #3: Confusing Function of the Vint Logo
“I think this app is very poorly designed.” –Lisa
Users would click on the Vint logo expecting it to take them back a page. Instead, the logo took them to the main page. Once in the main page, clicking on the logo would exit users out of the app. Get rid of the Vint logo after the homepage. It’s not needed because you know what app you are in. Instead, include the back arrow to show users how to go back in a page. (leaning on material design). They couldn’t see the back button because the logo asset is too big.
If you compare the Vint logo to another app’s logo (in this case, Gmail), you can see that the Vint logo is larger. This might have added to the difficulty users had in noticing the back arrow:
I realize that Vint’s design is in keeping with Andriod’s design principles but the logo isn’t needed- users know what app they’re in. Instead, I am leaning on material design and recommending that they remove the logo and increase the size of the back arrow.
This is similar to Airbnb’s app:
(It’s worth noting that when you click on the Vint logo while on the main page, it will exit you out of the app. This happened to every user I interviewed and their reaction was a mixture of surprise, confusion and dismay.)
Moving Forward:
There are several other recommendations that I will be addressing in the near future. Like….onboarding! This wasn’t something I could complete within a short timeframe but designing an onboarding experience would solve several problems I noticed, including cancelation, confusing profiles and unclear categorization.
I really like how Pinterest does onboarding and recommend that Vint create a similar experience.
So stay tuned for Vint: Part deux (and updates on how that wedding dress fits).
I do not work for Vint and am not affiliated with them in any way. I do use the app and am passionate about providing delightful user experiences.
