big red sublet
duration | aug - dec ‘19, jun ‘21 (redesign)
role | ux & ui designer and researcher
team | 3 ux researchers and designers, 2 ux researchers
tools | figma, balsamic, illustrator, fresco
course | human-computer interaction design
research space
Problem
At Cornell, the overall subletting process is difficult to navigate especially for sublessors as they lack information and guidance. Currently, the widely used platform and primary mode of direct communication is Facebook, which is inefficient and lacks many key features.
objectives
empathize
To get a holistic understanding of the current situation and the sentiments of people in this space, we created a standardized interview protocol and conducted 5 user interviews. From these interviews, each member on the team took extensive notes and we then visualized these interviews in an Affinity Diagram.
Affinity Diagram
We created 5 subgroups for this Affinity Diagram:
ideation
Each member in the team individually generated design ideas ranging from tangible products to technological software:
user tasks
We generated 5 user tasks to test various aspects of the prototype. These tasks remained consistent when testing various fidelities of our prototype.
prototyping
We split the prototyping into 3 distinct phases - low, mid, and high fidelity. With each phase of the process, we conducted user testing and iterated on the designs.
low fidelity
• used paper and markers to create wireframes
• users physically interacted with the prototype
takeaways
• need more text to prompt the user on various icons
• lack of support/help features
mid fidelity
• used balsamiq to create wireframes
• users clicked through a pdf file for testing
takeaways
• information overload in the explore page
• rethink the positioning of the messaging icon
high fidelity
• used Figma to create wireframes
• users clicked through the prototype during testing
takeaways
• lack of feedback messages
• navigation to user profiles is hidden and not consistent
final design
redesign
Following the course, I redeisgned the ui and ux components and created a curated visual aesthetic to align more for the target user group - Cornell students. The addition of more red in the design helps reinforce the community that this product serves. Additionally, the redesign serves to enhance the market differentiating features of this product - matching user groups and in-app messaging.
