The Ask
Improving the NYC Tourism digital experience
Appnovation, the digital consultancy I worked for, was approached by NYC Tourism to help them improve the overall experience of NYCTourism.com.
The Goal
Improving growth in a post-pandemic era
The goal of this project was to ensure NYC Tourism is a competitive platform spotlighting New York City, attracting locals and new travelers and economic growth during a post-pandemic period.
The Research
Conducting heuristic analysis, and competitor research
The team and I conducted UX heuristics audit on the site to get an in-depth understanding of what the core problem may be for users and businesses alike. We use these research findings to come up with a hypothesis which we will use to test. Which will be used as the driving factors for the final designs.
Focusing the Heuristic Evaluation at 3 specific criteria
The 3 specific heuristic criteria evaluation that we focused on are the following:
Auditing the Destination Marketing Organization (DMO) digital experience
We realize that some of the UX features are core to the existing destination marketing organization (DMO)’s digital experience. So in this audit, using the previously mentioned criteria models, we focused on these 4 DMO features:
Filtering & Sorting: This functionality shows up in instances of search and also when a user is going through pages that contains large numbers of embedded links or jumping off points.
Directories: These are used primarily by travel trade professionals and meeting planners. It helps users narrow in on specific options from a vast list of pages.
Itinerary Builder: This tool allows the user to plan a trip with the help of a mapping tool, they can then share it with their friends and family members - mainly used by visitors.
Inspirational Content: This page showcases content such as articles, informing and inspiring travelers to visit NYC - mainly used by visitors.
Inspirational Content: This page showcases content such as articles, informing and inspiring travelers to visit NYC - mainly used by visitors.
Let’s learn from competitors.
How they run the business?
During this heuristic audit stage, I also conducted a comprehensive UX heuristic audit from 4 other tourism websites and specifically researching their DMO pages.
Indirect Competitors I’ve analyzed:
Los Angeles
Nashville
Dubai
Holland
For each indirect competitor, the team and I created charts looking at the 4 features previously mentioned above (Filtering & Sorting, Directories, Itinerary Builder, Inspirational Content) to calculate an error percentage using the severity rating formula.
So, what did we find with our in-depth research findings?
NYCTourism.com is performing averagely in comparison to the other DMOs when it comes to content and design.
We found that NYCTourism.com has many errors with its information architecture. Further attention and improvements is necessary for better information structure.
Compared to other indirect competitor’s DMO sites, we found that NYC Tourism lacks in providing users different ways of getting to their required information. There’s a lack of a fully functioning search bar, menus, and general site navigation is not in accordance with the expectations of the user’s mental model.
The Hypothesis
Using our research insights,
we came up with a hypothesis
From our heuristic audit and in-direct competitive market analysis, the team and I hypothesize the following:
The current Information Architecture of NYC Tourism makes it unclear for users during their site navigation journey.
We believe this is why users stick to their usual paths without exploring new pages where they could discover more interesting, useful information and features.
Personas and Usability Testing
Creating assumption based personas based on existing user assumptions
Why assumption based personas?
We want to compare the assumptions based personas with the researched based ones after synthesizing our moderated interview findings.
Next Steps: Comparing what is good
From the comparison, we’ll see where NYC Tourism has been in terms of aligning with their user’s needs and behaviours.
Next Steps: Comparing what is bad
We’ll also see which assumptions were proven to be false, and gain insights into what needs to be focused on and addressed for future design implementations.
Personas and Usability Testing
Using the hypothesis to frame scenarios for the moderated usability test
Using the hypothesis that was concluded from the initial UX Heuristic report, I conducted and led the 25 moderated usability interviews at 1 hour long each. 3 hypothesis were used to informed these moderated tests, but for the purpose of this case study, I will focus on the third hypothesis which was:
— Our third user hypothesis
In Summary:
25 hours of user interviews.
25 unique users with different goals and needs.
5 user groups.
Personas and Usability Testing
What we found with the
moderated usability tests
Conducting the usability tests proved to be great insight because some of our findings were interesting and took me in a direction that I had not anticipated. From all the data and insights we gathered during the 25 hour usability tests process, my team and I grouped similar themes and synthesized all our findings into an affinity map.
The Solution?
Redesign NYC Tourism’s Informational Architecture
After confirming our initial hypothesis using real user data insights and also creating 3 researched based personas, the team and I decided to focus on redesigning NYC Tourism Informational Architecture.
Aligning insights from users and stakeholders and using design principles to focus on key solutions
The goal of the Informational Architecture's redesign is to:
Properly breadcrumbing to give users ability to move between different types of content without getting lost
Better signposting and labelling/copy to clearly indicate new content and useful features
Reducing the breadth of navigation menu and sitemap by merging similar categories helping users understand content organization
Showcasing the new NYC Tourism Informational Architecture Menu
After synthesizing the card sort and tree test findings, and looking into 13 other DMOs’ menus for ideation, this the new refined and simplified menu we’ve created.
Working closely with the development and engineering team, the team and I created wireframes, and high-fidelity mockups of the final iteration UI web and mobile designs.
Before
After
Fully Responsive
Mobile Design
