WAI - WHERE AM I
My Team
Design Team Lead: Minney Chiu (me)
Teammates: U’Darrin Harvey, JR & Shahd Rdawi
Timeline
November - December 2023 (4 weeks)
project overview
In the modern urban landscape, discovering local businesses while on the move can be cumbersome
With so many establishments opening up, and people constantly on the hunt for new hangout spots, consumers need reviews more than ever. In my 4 weeks of Industry Design Experience, I was fortunate enough to partner up with 2 other design students to help WAI design an application for their short-form video reviews.
white paper research
Short-form videos can provide a new experience when it comes to reviews
Starting with white paper research, I wanted to explore the psychology and the effects between traditional reviews and short-form video reviews. I especially want to target the emotions users feel when interacting with short-form video content — that’s where I found on Research Gate that:
“…short-form videos are appealing to most content consumers because of the content’s influence on feeling and enjoyment... short-form videos can reduce negative emotions, which can lead to addiction.”
Competitive Analysis
Standardized layout can definitely be worked on
With the preference for short-form video content in mind, I analyzed the 3 most prevalent apps in the market today to further note down any successes and areas that could be improved upon.
User Interviews
What would content creators like to see? What about content consumers?
After noting down all the successes and areas of improvement within our competitor, it’s time for us as a team to hear it from the users themselves. With 2 different groups of users, we need to find out which features can benefit both user groups and implement them accordingly.
INTERVIEW QUESTIONS FOR THE CREATORS:
When you’re posting reviews, what feature is the most useful?
When you’re posting reviews, what features do you not utilize?
Is there a way you search for past reviews?
In an ideal world, how would you like to write reviews?
Do you interact with your review responses?
INTERVIEW QUESTIONS FOR CONTENT CONSUMERS:
What do you look for when you’re reading reviews?
When you see a review in a video format, how do you interact with it?
What information is most useful to you when finding new establishments?
The main insight
Less words are more for short-form video content!
Based on the trends of my affinity map, I grouped all the feedback and desired features together to create a User Flow chart and started on sketches.
Minney’s sketches
Shahd’s sketches
U’Darrin’s sketches
dESIGN
Flow from video to information page
At first, the design team spent about 3 days going back and forth iterating different ways to incorporate an area that can provide information to the content consumer. This can include business name, business address, phone number, menu, directions, etcetera. The design team also needed to keep in mind the screen real estate that is slowly crowding up on the main video display screen. After rounds and rounds of iteration sessions, the team decided together that the information page would take place outside of the video display page.
LOW-FIDELITY DESIGN + TESTING
Setbacks & Successes
Based on the feedback from 2 separate testing groups conducted by the design team and the WAI DevOps team, the low-fidelity paper prototype testing was deemed successful with some minor changes.
The final Screens
The final product
conclusions + lessons learned
What I learned this time & things to do differently
Working with a client for the first time as a UX designer, especially when tasked with crafting the initial designs for their app, is a rich learning experience. It involves not only creating innovative designs but also educating the client on the principles of UX. Some things I appreciate doing well would be fostering a collaborative environment and effective communication with clients. This resulted in a more holistic and refined app design.
What I would do differently next time is clearly lay out the roles of each team member. During this project, there were moments when teammates were resistant and confused regarding the tasks designated to them. This caused an unbalanced workload between each of the team members. As a team lead, I tried my best to assist with all of the members’ inquiries, but it can get demoralizing to experience tension among teammates.