Since I was used to working solo, I had no concept of the way different designers functioned. So I undertook the Google UX course to see how designers at Google went about their process. Taking the course was one of the best decisions I made because it got my fundamentals right. It was a simple but valuable course that taught me the value of UX research.
We used a random prompt generator to generate the idea for the project. I got a ‘Menu and Payment App for a Family Diner’. The scope of the project covered everything from User Journey mapping to Wireframing and Prototyping.
Interviewing users
I interviewed 4 people hailing from different backgrounds. From the interview transcript, I created personas and outline pain points. I was able to create two broad personas on the basis of the interviewees and derived the 2 distinct pain points.
- Inability to customize the ingredients of a dish
- Inability to search for an exact dish
The user journey for ordering food online is quite a well established process so creating the subtasks for the goal ‘Ordering and paying for food on an app’ was straightforward.
The initial designs did not even include a home screen or a performance tab, the general consensus was that visually, the app was lacking. So I dove back in to make a it a better user experience by using the feedback I had gotten from the team
I made a more visual representation of the User journey via a storyboard to help me visualize the wireframe a bit better.
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The initial designs did not even include a home screen or a performance tab, the general consensus was that visually, the app was lacking. So I dove back in to make a it a better user experience by using the feedback I had gotten from the team
Making the wireframe on the basis of the close up storyboard was especially easy. I realized that more time on paper can help save time on the screen.
I tried to include as much animation and interaction as possible even in the lo fi prototype to ensure the first usability study did not leave any gaps before I started making the Hi Fi prototypes. Below is an interactable Lo Fi prototype
I conducted a simple and informal usability study with a singular task ‘Order a burger’. It was an in person unmoderated usability study, where I just noted down obstacles that users face while they were completing their task and once the task was completed I asked them for points of feedback.
I also made a note of their click path to see what the choices that people took.
The usability study unearthed one problem face by 2 out of the 5 users, not knowing when a product was added to the cart. So I ensured that this problem was solved by animating the 'Cart' Button, making the cart button was more prominent and finally I also added a small toast that notified when a product was added.
After implementing the points of feedback from the Usability Study the Hi Fi screens and prototype were ready with micro interactions and animations. This was a gratifying experience getting to document the experience end to end. The Hi Fi prototype can be found below along with mock ups of the screen.
The app is an ode to simplicity and focuses on the core principles of legibility to help mold satisfying user experience.
I learnt that sometimes you don’t need to reinvent the wheel, if someone else has done something right we don’t need to do it differently for the sake of being different.