PROJECT OVERVIEW
Explore a problem/area of opportunity for an existing brand.
Choose the problem and the brand. Explore and work with technical constraints.
PROBLEM/OPPORTUNITY
Rotten Tomatoes is known as a film review and news aggregator and is seen as a trustworthy website when it comes to film reviews. We see an opportunity for Rotten Tomatoes to provide users the information for what they need to find out to determine the best app for their topic of interest. (e.g. best food app, best movie app).
We see an opportunity for Rotten Tomatoes to use their current business plan and expand it to include a new division to provide users with information and reviews on apps. People want to easily find the best apps based on their topic of interest. Rotten Tomatoes can simplify the process of evaluating whether an app matches the users needs by providing them with the necessary information they need to determine the best app such as quick synopsis/summary of the review, a rating system and user reviews.
TECHNICAL BACKGROUND & RESEARCH
Possibilities: Navigating the responsive website, rating an app and leaving a review.
Constraints: Must be logged in to see what’s popular with friends and their reviews. Cannot download another device’s app (e.g. Android app onto iPhone)
API: Facebook, Twitter and respective app store (iOS, Android & Windows) API’s will be needed to pull information from to make use of functionality and data.
COMPETITIVE AND COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
As part of our business research, we took a look at how one might look up a review through Rotten Tomatoes and it’s competitors who offer similar services by doing competitive/comparative analysis of user flows.
The “Task” was to look up a review.
USER RESEARCH/INTERVIEWS
We conducted 12 interviews.
We found that people downloaded multiple apps to test in order to determine which is best for them. Most users were on-the-go while some prefer to read app reviews on their desktop when at home or work. They typically found apps through recommendation and skimmed, and sometimes ignored the app reviews.
From the interview we were able to determine key takeaways and trends.
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7 out of 12 people found apps through word of mouth
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5 out of 6 people uses the app store to download apps
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5 out of 6 people rely on screenshots to gauge the app’s credibility
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10 out of 12 people like the star rating
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7 out of 12 people will write a review if the process is easy enough
PERSONA CREATION
Based off our research we developed two personas. First we have “Steve, the Seeker,” He activly looks for apps and will purchase apps, and/or make in-app purchases. His main goal is to find and download an app to improve his lifestyle.
Steve’s scenario: Steve just saw "The Martian" and wants to download the best movie app so he can write his own review. We approached his scenario through our design by providing recommended apps and the quick summary based on the app he was searching for.
Second we have “Samantha, the Non-Seeker.” Her goals were to download the latest apps based on her friends recommendations.
Samantha’s scenario: Samantha wants to download the best app based on her friend’s recommendations. We approached her scenario through our design by showing her what apps are popular with her friends when she’s logged in to the site.
DESIGN STUDIO & WIREFRAMING
We ran a design studio to get our creative juices flowing. We each came up with some sketches, gave each other feedback and then continued to iterate and combine ideas until we came up with our first set of wireframes.
We began usability testing on the paper prototypes from the results and findings of the test we were able to make our first iteration. After a second round of usabiltiy testing with those findings we created the second and final iteration of the landing page.
ITERATION 1
ITERATION 2/PROTOTYPE
For the Review page, we crammed too much information into a small space we didn’t utilize the vertical scroll until the second iteration. Screenshots were overlooked as users missed that you could enlarge and scroll through them. Some users understood that the arrows were a voting system, but were confused as to actually how to place a vote, in addition they didn’t really care to vote on the reviews, but actually the app itself, some didn’t know what it was completely. The meter rating bar was a waste of space, participants didn’t understand what it was or represented.
SITE MAP
This is a list of webpages a user can access through the homepage. API’s for Facebook, Twitter and appropriate app stores are needed in order to make use of functionality and data.
SWIM LANES
Next, based on our conversation with a developer, below is an example of a swim lane diagram which shows a users interaction with the interface and the system. We are able to see when infomation needs to be uploaded and/or downloaded from the server through each step in the process.
NEXT STEPS...
In conclusion, some areas we would like to explore in the future:
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Usability test the second iteration
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Compare and analyze the second usability test results with prior usability test results
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Test the desktop iteration
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Explore other possible error states for both mobile and wireframe
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Do a better job of filtering content by platform
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Conduct more testing and analyze results to improve experience for users