Intro
I was tasked with prototyping two sides of a peer-to-peer shopping service that sells handmade, unique, or vintage clothing and jewelry: The interaction of people purchasing goods from the service through a native mobile application; and the interaction of people selling goods from the service and managing it through a web-based application running on a desktop/laptop.
Process
- Establish primary personas and settings.
- Develop contextual scenarios - the most important ones for the personas' success.
- Document information architecture and flow diagram for each of the scenarios that allow users to complete the tasks proposed.
- Create low fidelity mockups for key interaction points.
1. Native Mobile Shopping Application
Primary Shopper Persona: Amy, a 39 year old social worker in Seattle who likes shopping for new and unique clothing in funky boutiques and stores. Her time is limited and she wants recommendations and guidance for making the most of it when looking for new shops online.
Information Architecture: The application-wide IA was developed based on five key scenarios for potential customers like Amy. Those contexts include discovering new shops that cater to the user's interest, finding out if favorite shops have new merchandise, and connecting with other shoppers and sharing recommendations.
Scenarios: One of the five scenarios included a purchase which enabled direct contact with the seller. In this one, Amy has an important dinner in a few weeks. She wants to go online to buy something handmade, vintage, or unique enough that no one else will be wearing anything similar. She would like to be able to chat with the seller via messaging before purchase in case she has questions about quality and details.
View Mobile Buyer Application prototype (InVision)
2. Web-Based Seller Application
Scenarios:
- Signing up as a new seller (form design & zero state considerations).
- Listing items and managing stock by simplifying repetitive actions (informing about what is still available, what is still actionable for the seller, how the seller de-lists items that are sold, and how can the seller get better?).
- Getting paid and auditing sales (prioritization of complex data, complex data entry).
- Building an incentive structure for buyers (implemention of personalization or incentive structure to ensure a good buyer experience via the seller).
Information Architecture:
Outcome
After user testing, a couple issues with the original prototypes emerged. These were broken out under the three key tasks below:
- Signing up as a new seller
- Listing items and managing stock
- Getting paid and auditing sales
Figure 6 below is one example of mockup revisions that were made after usability testing. Task one consisted of three screens: Signing up as a new seller; Creating an account by completing a short form; and Editing the seller profile page.
On the form screen, it was suggested that the seller enter first and last separate since the site uses only the first name in personalization later in the scenario. To fix this issue, the name field was split into two for first/last.
As I observed users, I thought the "Becoming a Seller" task could have been made clearer with the inclusion of additional screens to illustrate more of the process. For example, between screens two and three a step is assumed of the tester, that of entering seller profile information. To make this clearer, a screen with a form asking for profile information was inserted between them. This intermediate screen made it more obvious that the next screen is what the profile will look like with the information and that it provides an option to edit that information.
I also did not clearly indicate if the seller profile page is the "Home" screen or the "Manage Storefront" screen. I originally set it up as the screen for the latter, but after feedback found that it was assumed to be the former. In a redo the location is indicated on the left navigation as the storefront page. The home screen is a dashboard of several summaries of top selling items, recent sales - quick information for the seller.
