Overview
Adding a new feature to the most beloved traveling app.
Our goal as a company is to find a method to separate ourselves from the market, to make out application stand out and the way to do this is by adding a reminder feature that would let the users keep track of their travel date. Along with the reminder feature, we will add tips and advice on what exactly to do and what not to do when going to this destination; this will be provided by the community.
Duration
Jan - Mar (12 weeks)
Role
UX Researcher
Product/UI Designer
Team
Solo
Design Challenge
HMW create a solution for users to remember their flights without leaving the application?
Background:
Kayak.com is a household name for booking, finding affordable and reliable travel arrangements. Their primary purpose is to enable their users to find and reserve flights, hotels, rental vehicles, and other additional features to booking a trip.
The Problem:
The market, however, operates with a saturation of competitors. In order for Kayak.com to stay in front of the curve and prevent becoming obsolete, the product design team will inherit and evaluate user interviews to identify and implement a feature to Kayak.com’s existing product in order to find features that will provide value to both the user and business.
Solution Preview
Reminder Tool
With a click of a button, Kayak will be able to let the user know how many days are left until their departure date.
It will make the planning phase much simpler since it will be all on one application instead of closing Kayak and going to your calendar app.
The reminder tool will also be able to provide the user with tips and advice on what to bring and what not to bring, giving the user more time to relax than stress over the trip.
Research
Competitive Research
Market Research
I started with analyzing the market to get a better understanding about the traveling industry, and its current trends.
How it works.
How we started chipping away the problem is by doing a market research. I looked at other trip applications to see what exactly they’re doing to grasp the attention of their users and how we can mimic that as well to make our application better. Along with the market research, we will also continue with a Jobs to be done framework with wire framing.
Jobs to be done
With information obtained from the previous step, we used the JTBD & Job Stories methodologies to break down and organize the given information into detailed, step-specific problem questions. From there, we theorized on possible barriers, anxieties, and stressors for the given user, and created a job map with outcome statements to find a detailed problem “route” to explore. Through doing this, we learned that ease of group travel, centralization of information, and personalized suggestions/reviews were most important (and most lacking) for our users.
Design
How Might We
HMW create a solution for users to remember their flights without leaving the application?
User Flow madness
Taking charge of the Ideation process, I decided to design and own the user flow for the app.
Results
The feedback that was received from 5 of our interviewers was positive, with many noting the convenience of having their funds available immediately. There would still need to be a couple of issues in regard to the fluidity of the feature, but there will be a better product in the future.
What I learned
This project was my first time designing an end-to-end mobile app which provided me with an excellent opportunity to learn mobile design and practice my design skills. I'm glad that I have an opportunity to deep dive into iOS Human Interface guidelines to better understand how I should design apps that bring more pleasant & desirable experiences for mobile users.
Gain an understanding of the competition that there is in the booking business.
Learn how the crucial role of UX writing & microscopy plays to guide users clearly and precisely. This ensures that users can achieve their goals with minimal friction while interacting with the app, especially during onboarding flows.
Moving forward
Conduct another round of usability studies to validate whether the pain points users experienced have been effectively addressed.