BACKGROUND
đŠđģâđģ My Role:
đ¸ Research
đ¸ UXUI design
đ¸ Prototyping
đ¸ Usability Testing
âŗ Project duration:
February 2021 - Present
đ§ Tools used:
đ¸ Adobe XD
đ¸ Figma
đ¸ FigJam
Nailerz is an online platform where licensed and non-licensed nail technicians, and small businesses go to promote nail beauty services to clientele in the New York City area. Its mission is to provide additional income support to small businesses and nail technicians in the beauty industry. Users will also have the ability to find nail services that are tailored to their personal beauty needs from an on-demand business model.
đ AWARDS
âī¸ Second place in the Women and Tech category
âī¸ Audience choice award
đŧ Startup Incubator 2021
A startup incubator at The City College of New York
As Product Design Lead, I have... đ
âī¸ Led and managed two junior designers on the UXUI design of the application and website (Work In progress)
âī¸ Planned and facilitated design sprint to identify product MVP and user journey map
âī¸ Conducted user and secondary research to hypothesize design solutions in aligning to the business MVP (minimum viable product)
âī¸ Holds ownership of the entire design of multiple experiences on the mobile application
âī¸ Hands off and maintains constant communication with developers on application development and first phase of deployment on the app store
DESIGN PROCESS
Research
đ¸ Competitive Analysis
đ¸ User Personas
đ¸ User Journey Map
Competitive Analysis đ
To understand the position of Nailerz in the nail industry, I performed SWOT analysis on several key competitors that are dominating the on-demand beauty business, such as Priv, Booksy, and Glamsquad.
Several key factors to differentiate Nailerz from these competitors:
1ī¸âŖ The only mobile platform that specialize in nail services
2ī¸âŖ Ability to provide service 24 hours / 7 days a week
3ī¸âŖ An endorsement system for nail technicians in NYC area
Personas đ
Three major user groups were identified from the user interviews. These personas were created to represent each core users that will potentially use the platform for business and nail services.
User Stories & User Flow đ
User stories were set up based on the three personas to determine the types of interaction specified to each individual while using the platform.
Two separate user flows were built based on the user group types (technicians vs. clients).
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Define
đ¸ Challenge Definition
đ¸ Design Sprint
đ¸ Product MVP
Challenge Definitionâ
HOW MIGHT WE...
help nail technicians reach a larger client base while enabling customers to discover and access trustworthy nail services on-demand?
Below are some pain points we discovered during marketing research within the nail industry:
In a B2B (independent nail technicians and small businesses) perspective:
- Lack of exposure in their local community
- Slow business growth
- No guaranteed job placement or job search support
- Dependency and lack of creative freedom working at nail salons
- Lack of administration system to keep track of appointments and client management
In a B2C (nail service customers) perspective:
- Unaware of new nail technicians and businesses in the local community
- Unsanitary nail salons and COVID spread concern (especially amid the pandemic)
- No clarity in appointment availabilities in local salons
- Dislike surcharges, hidden costs and up-sells
Design Sprint đ¨
I organized and facilitated a design sprint for my team to identify Nailerz's MVP and product direction. Through a series of time-boxed activities, we identified the needs of our target audiences, and brainstormed with a value proposition map, customer journey map, and impact/effort matrix.
Next, we empathize with users in phases of product journey, from awareness, consideration, installation, usage, to the review and sharing of the platform.
Product MVP đ
Among the top voted features and solutions from the value proposition map exercise, the top three MVPs are then identified based on the impact and effort criteria in the following brainstorming activity. We concluded our core MVP features are:
1ī¸âŖ Nail technicians and customer on-boarding
2ī¸âŖ Appointment booking
3ī¸âŖ Nail technician and client search
Ideate
đ¸ Low fidelity sketches
đ¸ Mid fidelity mockups
Low Fidelity Sketches
During early stages in the incubator competition, my task was to come up with low fidelity sketches or digital wireframes to present the top three product MVPs we determined from our design sprint exercise. I ideated and sketched out screens for on-boarding experience, and account dashboards after sign up or login.
Mid Fidelity Mockups
Once the design was approved, I dived into constructing mockups based on the sketches I drew previously. Since the branding colors have yet to be determined, I designed the mockups in mid fidelity range while keeping the product's MVP in mind for pitch deck and the presentation showcase. In the process, I designed a temporary logo as a placeholder for branding purposes.
đ Below are some of the mockups I designed:
Prototype
đ¸ Design System
đ¸ High fidelity prototype
Design System
To finalize the branding direction of Nailerz, I decided to reuse the same color scheme I initially utilized from the logo placeholder. I also added additional colors, and applied it towards the overall aesthetics for the platform. Then, I established the fonts and weights, and formulated components and key illustrations to the design system.
High Fidelity Prototype
I reviewed and conducted additional research on types of nail services a salon and independent nail technicians provide to their clientele. In doing so, I was able to design realistic booking, appointment tracking experiences as well as other relevant salon experiences to our potential platform users.
Design changes and updates đĄ
After discussion with the development team on logic mapping and additional research, I've made several key changes to the design:
đ Eliminated the design of client searching functionality â I determined it doesn't make sense for nail technicians to have the ability to search for clients, when they should receive automatic appointment notifications from the platform when they are booked with new clients.
đ Nail technicians and clients will have their separate portal.
đ Nail technicians have access to earnings dashboard.
đ Designed error states for all existing screens that ties to a value selection or entry logic.
Below are the highlights of the high fidelity mockups (right click to open in a new window to view enlarged image):
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_Booking/w=3840,quality=90,fit=scale-down)
_Tech_searh_results/w=3840,quality=90,fit=scale-down)
_Appointment_dashboard_(no_setup)/w=3840,quality=90,fit=scale-down)
_Appointment_preferences_(updated_preference)/w=3840,quality=90,fit=scale-down)
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_Appointment_confirmation/w=3840,quality=90,fit=scale-down)
_Earnings_(current_pay_period)/w=3840,quality=90,fit=scale-down)
View the clickable prototype here:
Usability Testing & Next Steps
Usability Testing đą
In the next phase of product development, usability tests will be conducted to ensure the design solution is viable with all the user groups. Currently, I am finalizing the planning of the test execution. Here are some objectives I have established in the upcoming milestone:
đš Recruit 8 to 10 target users for testing purpose
đš Draft interview questions for users' demographics
đš Identify and set up test case scenarios
đš Record all remote test sessions (per participant's approval)
đš Summarize test results and report to founder (evaluate MVP if necessary)
đš Update and change design accordingly depending on the test outcome
RESULTS COMING SOON...!
Next Steps âĄī¸
- Once the results have been determined from the usability test, design will be finalized and prepared for deployment with the coding team.
- Beta tests will be conducted before the platform is officially launched on the app store.
- Additional designs and logic mapping will be implemented for phase two updates, which is scheduled in the summer or fall of 2022.
What I've learned...
Takeaway đ¤
- Owning the entire product experience from research, ideation, to design requires tremendous effort and time. Working on this project in freelance capacity while working a 40 hour full time job is quite demanding. I am still learning to divide my time more efficiently in order to move forward with usability testing and maintaining constant communication with the coding team for initial product launch.
- I struggled to work on the design alone in the beginning, despite having two junior designers on the team. With the lack of time for training, I often felt uncomfortable to delegate work due to their inexperience. After consulting with my mentor and other senior designers, I learned that I had to start small, and gradually assign appropriate tasks that suits to their skills and experience level.
- Managing two junior designers as the product design lead taught me how to resolve conflicts in between teams; to approach my designers with empathy and work with them at their experience level; and showed me how to guide and delegate tasks (such as researching backend mapping logic in correspondence with the UI, and various error states etc.) appropriately in order to complete the project under strict milestone deadlines.
- Working closely with the coding team has been an eye opening experience - I value open communication and clear directions from both parties. Explaining and clarifying the design to the developers helped me to improve my design decision making skills and solidify my communication methods.
Check out my other case studies
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