Portfolio

Airlines

Portfolio item details

Airlines Portfolio: Airlines Portfolio

User Persona: User Persona

Research: Ethnographic-Interview-Airlines

User Understanding Doc Airlines Business Understanding Doc

Information Architecture Information Architecture

Project Role
I was the only Reserach and interaction designer throughout this project. Initially, I worked with a product manager to lay down the goals. Later on, I conceptualized the flows, created visual designs, and communicated the interactions to developers. 
 
 
Project Overview - Digital Transformation Through Mobile
  • Experience a new way of travelling through an mobile App to, book your Airlines flight, check-in or manage your reservation, all in a single application designed for all your needs.
  • A key focus for Airlines was to modernize their digital travel strategy by developing a more customer centric approach. With a particular emphasis on ease of use the apps incoporate comprehensive functionality and high-end UX and design to create a more interactive, user-friendly mobile travel experience.
 
Business Goals :
  • Flight search and tickets purchase
  • Check-in
  • Track the flight schedule and flight status
  • Book hotels and excursions between flights
  • Take advantage of the loyalty program
  • Receive notifications of promotions and changes in the schedule
  • Users say that Airlines notifications are either too late (ie they’re already on the plane) or are sent via email instead of the app, with no alert appearing in the app.
  • Explore Airlines goal: “Minimize confusion around check in and boarding
  • Offline in-flight entertainment
Problem
The main aspects focused on during the project include:
  • Find out current pain points for airline travelers
  • Improve upon existing features and aspects of the app
  • Learn about unmet needs airline travelers have that enhancements of the app could help
  • Audit and amend the flow and visual design to improve experience
  • Minimize confusion about boarding time and location
Additional considerations:
  • Confirming functionalities app users like that should remain the same or get minimal improvement
  • Prioritizing customer needs within the list of business goals, based on pain points from interview participants
 
Solution - UX strategy
Combined elements of the existing Airlines interface and looked to other travel app functionalities to improve the searching process and increase the ease of booking trips within the app.
The addition of the default low fare calendar was universally appreciated by users, increasing feelings of control and transparency.

UX Research and Design process

The Process

From the problem I experienced, I saw an opportunity here to improve the travel experience for other travelers. I used the Double Diamond Approach to ideate, refine, and create solution. Before beginning the divergent thinking—the first half of the Discover phase, I outlined the problems as:
I. Research  Empathize with Users-Interviews  
Research
Baseline Convertion
Comparative Analysis

I have intended to have a discussion with about four travelers validating the app.
Initial Research and Market Research
Phase 1: Discovery I compared major airlines and read user reviews to identify user delights and pain points.
Process: We reached out to users, both frequent and firstime travellers for reviews, issues about usability or functionalities on the existing product. I’ve categorised the complaints into 5 key pain points .
  • Part 1: Unstructured conversations with app users
  • Part 2: Evaluation of app reviews in Apple store
  • Part 3: Competitive analysis with other flight apps
  • Part 4: Comparative analysis with other travel apps
 
Based on the research, seat comfort, destination information, customer service, ease of check-in/boarding, and low fares were important to passengers when traveling for vacation and leisure. All would be recommended to be incorporated in a new airline product.
BASELINE CONVERSATIONS
I spoke with travelers at the airport about if/how they had used the Airlines app for the trip they were taking that day. Here's what I heard:
  • “I don’t trust an app to keep my credit card information, but it should remember me when I log in.” 
  • We conducted initial research to audit the Alaska app, compare it to other apps, and establish a baseline for comparison.
  • “I want the option to have a credit card saved, but it shouldn't be the default option”
“I booked my flight on my phone but it took forever. I probably won’t do that again.”
“I use the Airlines app for my boarding pass only.”
"I spelled my name wrong when I booked my ticket, which isn't Airlines fault, but I was already logged into the app so it would've been prevented if they had just auto-loaded my information. I had to go to the desk to try and fix it at the airport, and they said 'it should be fine' but that TSA would have the final say."
 
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS (AIRLINE APPS)  
I spoke with travelers at the airport about if/how they had used the Airlines app for the trip they were taking that day. Here's what I heard:
  • Started by auditing every screen and flow from top airline competitors, and then created a spreadsheet of all functionalities represented across apps. I noted whether each was present in Airlines, as well as the other apps I was comparing. At this time, no value judgement was made about the necessity of each feature, only a catalogue of what existed and how it was represented (i.e. if it led the user outside of the app, brought in a web browser, etc.)
  • After completing an analysis of other airline apps, we also looked into other apps within the travel arena at large, starting with the ones we used ourselves, which were Hopper, Kayak, and MTM.
  • Among those apps, we found that concepts we had considered — sharing, saving, and watching — were represented in a variety of ways (depicted left). We used these features as reference when considering our design flows and functionality.
Phase 2: User Interviews  
Process: From the initial research, we developed a screener interview investigating user behavior around mobile and desktop apps and airline ticket purchasing, then selected key participants for 1-on-1 interviews to further define behaviors around Alaska app use and needs.
  • Part 1: 45 participants in online habits screener
Part 2: 9 participants for 1-on-1 interviews diving into attitudes and actions

Pain points and process:

    
I usually have to switch back and forth with the app and desktop to find easy to see prices, and I go to a bunch of sites and apps, like Kayak and Hopper to look for low fares and track price changes. I’d always prefer to fly Alaska, but it’s hard to get that same information.”
- user1		 I travel with my husband and sometimes need to find childcare for the dates we’re going. So, I have to coordinate dates with him, my parents, and finding availability for where we want to stay. I want to be able to save and share easily, but it’s mostly screenshots, emails, and texts, and it’s hard to track.”
- User2		 book through mobile apps exclusively, but mostly it’s Google flights for the trust, unbiased view, and clear layout; Hipmunk because they rate flights by convenience; and Hopper, for how it lets me follow price changes.”
- User3
     

Key habits and conclusions:

    
  • Price is the largest deciding factor when choosing to book a flight
  • Users want information on deals within the app, or were surprised when clicking a “deals” email on their phone led to a mobile website rather than the app
  • Users want a clear layout of dates and prices as the norm
  • Users share data during the booking process with screenshots and would like a better share functionality, as the majority of participants plan trips with others
  • Users don’t book their flight the first time they search, so they have to reenter information from scratch every time.
  • People want clearer information about where they are in the buying process during the entire booking and purchasing process
  • Entertainment and in-flight experience is not important to anyone we interviewed
  • Users are typically uncomfortable or frustrated with flaggingdown a flight attendant
  • Users tend to experience several issues paying for wifi and entertainment onboard
  • Users expect and desire free amenities inflight to offset thecost of flying
  • Users want more of a variety of food and entertainment optionsand will bring their own devices because of this
II. Synthesis  Heuristic Evaluation 

Persona
Journey Map

 The current layout is simple and minimalistic. In addition to evaluating the current schedule section, I asked two participants to review in order to get objective feedback. The results are as follows:
   
Customer Journey : Creating the Persona
 
After we had some sense of what the central problems and desires were, we decided to really probe into our users’ minds by mapping out a potential customer journey. This allowed us to further identify pain points and pleasurable moments our user would experience using our app before, during and after a flight.The proto-personas our team brainstormed prior to our research eventually paved the way to two informed personas: Jen, the occasional traveler in a long-distance relationship, and Luis, the frequent business traveler.
III. Ideation 

Planning and Design Goals
Wireframing

My next step was to begin ideating and sketching out how the final application could look like. This helped me set the overall framework for the final high fidelity designs.Now that we had a strong idea of who our user was, it was time to use our data to come up with a concise and defined problem and solution that would satisfy what was missing for our user’s flight experience, and pair it with a goal Delta wanted to meet.
We aimed to remove the pain point of having to download two separate apps, and thus combine what Delta wanted to offer in a simple, intuitive interface that was quickly accessible from the existing Airlines app.
 
PLANNING AND DESIGN GOALS
With so many factors to focus on, we chose a flow that emphasized clarity of information, convenience, and collaboration specifically in the booking process
  • Existing functions: Rework booking process to integrate a cleaner interface with a default low price grid immediately visible upon choosing a destination.
  • New functions: To address the redundancy of reentering information, we added a recent search option, intuitive origin, and back button
  • New flows: With a focus on collaboration, we created save, share, and watch functions, creating screens to draft the flow within the app.
  • Design aesthetics: Consistency with look and feel.
  • With so many factors to focus on, we chose a flow that emphasized clarity of information, convenience, and collaboration specifically in the booking process.
 
IV. Prototype   

User Flow
Prototype
Iterations
Testing

 

PROPOSED FLOW
Focused on possible attrition points in the booking process:
Need to share information
  • Time need, stopping the process and picking up again later
  • Desire to find lower prices
 
 

Prototype
We led 10 users through the prototype, instructing them on the parameters of the search (location, timing), as well as the background story of Allie's travel needs. We took notes of problem areas, pauses, and questions. We were able to gather data on the overall booking process as well as the success of the newly added functions
 
 

ITERATIONS & Testing
After testing with multiple users, we found that users:
  • Were able to go through the search and booking process with minimal confusion
  • Enjoyed the experience more than they remembered enjoying the booking experience on the previous mobile app
  • Were delighted by the sharing via text and email options
  • Had questions about the differences between save and watch buttons and functions
  • Weren’t always immediately able to locate the continue button to move through the process, but were able to find it without help from the usability tester
  • Rated any confusion they had as “mild”

Next Step

Iterations & Testing:
  • Test the Continue button in our current version and iterate on feedback.
  • Implement our changes and new features into Alaska’s current app.
  • Introduce a Tour to show users the new features of the app and test understanding, along with an attrition study: Do users remember the functionalities and locations of new features a week later, without the tour?
  • Iterate on the Alerts feature, with added screens to illustrate the Notifications and Deals information availability
V. RESULTS
 
Solution :
  • Added Alerts section in navigation bar to remedy confusion about where to find notifications for boarding gates, times, and delays.
  • Airlines needs to sync alerts in real time within their system to make use of this feature.
  • Airlines also defined a goal to create a solution for users when their phones die or they don’t have a phone.
  • As everyone we surveyed had a smart device, this was less of a priority during this sprint.
  • In the future, we could examine ways to integrate needed features into existing Airlines kiosks at the Check-In area as well as in Horizon-designated gate areas
 

Takeaways
  • From deciding the place to selecting the flights comparing with other details are given in one singe app. The user gets delighted and content even before the trip. So they can just recline and relish the tour.
  • Do lots of research before getting started, understand who you are designing for, plan and design according to that. Use existing data such as reading material on web, books and articles to support your design choices and the context of your design.
  • Understand your user, which means put yourself in another person’s shoes in order to create products that respond to human needs.
 
 
 
 

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