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Case Study

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Product Design

Real reviews,

from real people

A digital solution for review seekers

Overview

Peach Review is a personalized social platform dedicated to connecting online shoppers to authentic reviews. It's a solution for improving shoppers' buying confidence and experience in the digital realm.

Timeline

8 weeks
Oct - Dec 2020

Role

UI/UX Design
User Research
User Testing
Branding

Watch the demo

Tools

Figma
Sketch
InVision
Adobe Illustrator
Procreate
Notion

Overview

Research & Discover

Discover problem space & conduct user-centered research

Research & Discover

Design Process

User-Centered Approach

Problem Space

Design thinking in everyday life

The spark of this design project happened when I was looking up reviews for ergonomic chairs on Google, for the third time on the same day. After conducting preliminary research on relevant topics, I was able to define a problem space that is worth exploring. 

 

Our ability to make confident online purchases relies heavily on reviews. Yet the majority of millennials don’t trust reviews on vendor websites and are growing skeptical of influencers.

Millennials read online reviews before selecting a business

Consumers trust content shared by peers more than brands

Millennials spent more on online shopping during COVID

How Might We

Reframing the problem

Based on these insights, I refined the problem space to focus on a specific demographic: the millennial online shoppers.

 

This is an impactful problem space especially during the ongoing COVID pandemic - more and more people are turning to online shopping due to quarantine and safety concerns.

How might we bring confidence to the millennial online shoppers by encouraging authentic reviews?

User Interview

Gathering insights of target users

I conducted qualitative interviews with five millennials who have the habit of shopping online (target users). I was able to confirm assumptions made as well as collect insights. The most common topics that emerged from these interviews are:

Buying Confidence

Millennials seek information from valid reviews to build confidence in the product and their purchase.

Reliable & Unbiased Source

Millennial shoppers seek assurance from unbiased sources due to lack of trust for sellers.

Sympathetic Experience

Millennial shoppers seek relevant content and gravitate towards the reviews from people they resonate with.

Purchase Routine

Millennials always look up multiple reviews in order to feel comfortable buying the product.

Competitor Analysis

Identifying platforms in the market

During this process, I compared the existing review features and discovered what's missing - an opportunity for a social media platform that incorporates the engagement and interaction combined with the attribute filters and ranking.

Synthesis & Define

Using Information Architecture to understand and visualize research data

Synthesis & Define

User Personas

Defining primary users

The personas are developed with interview insights, reflecting target users' pain points, goals, and behaviours. Throughout the design process, I would refer back to them constantly in order to keep all design decisions user-centered.

Primary Persona

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Secondary Persona

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Experience Map

Identifying opportunities

I visualized the user's current experience of looking up reviews for online shopping, in the form of an experience map. This allowed me to identify the user's pain point and turn them into opportunities 

Experience Map

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Prototyping & Testing

Improving usability through "design, test, and repeat"

Prototyping & Testing

Task Development

Achieving the user's goal

With the persona's goals and needs in mind, I developed a value proposition for the product. I also created 30+ user stories on the user's interaction with potential product functionalities.

Value Proposition

Connect online shoppers to authentic reviews in order to improve shoppers' buying confidence and experience in the digital realm.

Core Epic

The core epic is an identified theme from user stories that reflects the product value proposition the most.

Search, filter, and sort Reviews

Selected Task

The selected task is used to develop a task flow.

Search and filter review content, and save them for later reference.

Task Flow

Task Flow

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Ideation

Translating sketches to wireframes

Based on the task flow, I sketched different low-fidelity screens on paper and translated them into mid-fidelity wireframes using Figma.

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Home

Search

Search Result

Result
Filters

Profile

Mid Fidelity Wireframes

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Usability Testing

Prioritizing & implementing feedback

As part of the design process, I conducted two rounds of usability tests with 10 users in order to obtain practical, real-time feedback. I was able to collect insights that were incorporated to improve the design at the end of each round of testing. These insights were mapped out to determine the priority for implementation.

Iterative Design Process

Visual Identity

Creating brand story and defining value

Visual Identity

Branding

Defining brand & UI direction

I started with listing out keywords and compiling moodboards for the two directions of UI that the product could potentially take. After revisiting the persona's need, I decided to go with option 2 for an effortless vibe.

Chosen moodboard

Moodboard 2
Moodboard 1

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Brand Name

After brainstorming and generating many potential names, I chose to use “Peach Review” as the brand name. “Peach” reflects the user’s goal of pursuing products that are pleasing or attractive; “Review” reflects the function of the app - allowing users to look up product reviews.

Name Exploration

Name exploration

Logo

Logo sketches

Elements

Wordmark

Font exploration

UI Elements

Creating the building blocks

I created a UI library using the Atomic Design System, in order to keep the design elements consistent on different screens and platforms. Only the visual identity components are shown here.

Final Product

High-Fidelity Interactive Prototype

I originally used "ergonomic chair" as the keyword for search, but changed it to "MacBook Pro" instead. Searching for a specific product is usually the case when people are looking up reviews, and also reflects the primary persona's interest in technology.

Landing Page

Marketing the product

I designed a responsive marketing website to be used for marketing purposes. The brand is about building trust with information, and real people creating authentic content. I created content to focus on the users, community, and providing context, rather than listing the technical features.


I also took this opportunity to address an app function that was not covered in my prototype task flow: user posting content and sharing with the community.

Multi-Platform Integration

Creating UI for Apple Watch

Since Peach Review is a consumer review platform where users build trust by sharing authentic content, social function is important for frequent users to connect with each other.

 

I created user stories for the primary persona, Jennifer, as she interacts with the app's social function on different platforms. She has a great interest in tech and apple gadgets, so I decided to develop an Apple Watch companion app.

Apple Watch UI 02.png

App Icon Tile

The Apple Watch UI has a very colourful palette, therefore I used brand purple for the background of the app icon.

Notifications

The user can turn on notifications for new comments or messages and has the option to reply from the watch or open up the app on her iPhone.

Messaging

The user can view chat history, and send text or voice messages.

Key Learnings

Providing context and real content

In user testing, I learned the importance to provide real content to users. With low fidelity wireframes, it is easier to fill the content with lorem ipsum and image place holders. This could cause confusion for users trying to interact with the prototype, and consequently affect testing results. By providing context (what is the user trying to accomplish with the app & why) and real content as early as possible (before hi-fi designs), the users can interact with digital interfaces in the most natural way.

Prioritizing user feedback

The amount of data collected during usability testing can be overwhelming. Therefore being able to prioritize feedback really helped with speeding up the implementation and allowed me to focus on the most critical issues. I also learned to balance my design decisions between user insights and heuristic considerations.

Future Consideration

Taking the Next Step

Peach Review's goal is to connect shoppers with authentic reviews. The key is authenticity. For next steps, it would be crucial to develop an algorithm that can effectively identify and push authentic user generated contents to feeds and search results.

 

In addition, the platform has the potential to offer more than just product reviews. Users can also post about an experience - reviews of a restaurant, a store, or a beauty clinic. I would like to explore these additional areas of interest and provide users with an stress-free experience of looking up reviews.

Tarot Card of Tech: The Superfan

The most passionate users of Peach Review are likely to be influencers or consistent content creators of specific niche markets. For example, tech geeks would review the latest and greatest tech gadgets on a consistent basis. Their authentic and informative content would attract followers with similar interests.

A community of influencers can potentially help increase credibility and sense of community on our platform. However, they could also be exploited by brands and sellers to post marketing content that are not genuine. It can be prevented by setting up rules and reward system, for example, an internal authenticity score of users: the higher the score the more likely their content can to be discovered by other users.

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