Visit for Me
UI/UX Designer /Individual Project
Problem
Finding a house is hard for new international students because they can not see the houses in person.
Background
Every year, around 1.5 thousand of new international students attend to in University of Michigan. Nearly 50% of them are students from Taiwan and China. These students need to find and reserve the house before coming to campus or they have no place to stay. However, finding a house without real visit is quite hard and risky, because they can not get “ real “ feeling to the house through photos on the housing website. Pictures of the house on the Internet are so limited. Some pictures are outdated; others are not clear or not from the perspective user desired. New international students suffer from the gap between the photos and the real house. In addition, some problems can’t not be identified through photos, such as the safety in surrounding, the neighborhoods, and the efficiency of maintenance and so on.
About current housing websites
Current frequently used housing website are collected can compared with users' need. The necessities are collected from international student during interviews.
Interviews
Firstly, I interviewed around 10 international students from Taiwan, China and India, recorded their problem and expectation to the housing website. Second, their problems and needs are collected and categorized. In the meanwhile, I prioritize the housing information that students need when considering a house.
Storyboards
Visually describes scenarios with storyboards. The storyboards shows the context, the problem, users' pain point, fear, and motivation.
Persona
Personas are created based on the real stories and behavior of real users. Their behavior and expectations drive the direction of the product. Users are categorized into primary and secondary users, so accurate design the solution suitable for them.
Brainstorming for solutions
40 sketches with more than 30 concepts made me consider different possibilities and look from different perspectives. The sketches have 3 main directions.
- Redesign the current housing website - providing more information, improving integration of these information with more intuitive interface.
- Providing the new service rather than redesign the original website- help user to visit the house or let them visit the house by their own.
- Providing the “real” feelings to the users.
Keep thinking about question during sketch: what user really need, what’s their problem, why these problem happen, and how to solve their problem? Any other form of solutions? In the brain storming, the number matters. Although some of concepts are too wild and can not be realized, but when you push yourself more, squeeze your brain, you will think differently and some great ideas come out. To illustrate, the living diagram of the house: how long should people spent to walk to nearest supermarket, bus station, bank and their friends house.
The solutions are graded by users. 0 - not helpful. 5 - very helpful.
Solution evaluation
Interview with sketches
Interviewed users with sketches from brainstorming. According to users’ reaction, I cut some wild ideas that are not helpful to general users and add some point users input during the interview. For example, how do people trust the agent? Thus, the website should be credited with UM. People feel school’s system is more reliable. In addition, only students can be agents, because most user think student are more trustworthy. Moreover, each agent should be not only graded but also given review. Users think review are more helpful than ratings sometimes because it provides the detailed reason and comments. Last, because some users have special needs, they should be able to communicate with agents.
Interview with narrowed concepts
To narrow the solution, I chose 8 concepts from 40 sketches, and ask interviewee to grade each solution from 1 to 5 point (5 means most helpful). I decided the price user willing to pay for the service. Lastly, "Visit for Me" is chosen from the concepts as the main solution because the rate - 3.9/5.0, the uniqueness of the design, and the sustainability. Average, students willing to pay $11 for each service.
Final Solution
"Visit for Me" service
“Visit for me” is a sustainable service helping new students to get the detailed and real experience about the house. Paying by clients (new students), agents (UM current students) go to the house client assigned, take pictures, video or conduct video call for clients and make their suggestion from the point of the real visit. Agents could earn money from the service and the
Design rationale
I utilize QOC (Questions, Options and Criteria ) to decide the main approach and features of the solution. First, I decided to integrate the “Visit for Me” service into house searching website so the exposure rate is higher and users don’t need to go to other place to find the service. Second, I added the introduction and highlight the “Visit for Me” in the home page because it’s a unique and innovative features. Third, the service fee varies with agent’s rating, so the agent are motivated to provide better service.
Sketches of wireframes
Quickly sketched the wireframe to check the overall flow.
Low-fi prototype
Paper prototype is a quick and easy way to test the interaction, flow and usability. Therefore, I used paper prototype to test the payment flow. I made two prototypes: "Pop out" and "Scroll down" and interview with 6 users. In the end, I decided to use scroll down because "scroll - down" is easier for users to check information. Also, I made some adjustment , including the editing button and interactive icons. Also, I adjusted the ratio of layout according to users' need (i.e. enlarged the map.).
