GigBoss
GigBoss, founded by a seasoned musician with 15 years of experience, is an innovative organizational conductor for freelancers, extending beyond its musical roots to empower a diverse creative community. GigBoss's mission is to streamline workflows, eliminate chaos, and provide freelancers with effortless organization, allowing them to focus on their craft.
Background
Methods
Cognitive Walkthrough
Contextual Inquiry
Affinity Diagramming
IA Diagramming
Tools
Figma
FigJam
Google Suites
CapCut
Meet the Team!
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Lily Yang
UX Designer
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Jonny Fuller
UX Designer
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Maddie Nilan
UX Designer
Defining the Problem
To address the opportunity for improvement, our challenge was to enhance GigBoss by adding functionality and improving the user experience for freelancers, ensuring their needs were met efficiently and enjoyably.
Understanding Our Users
Users needed a seamless platform to organize upcoming and past gigs, alongside their finances. To comprehend their needs, two user stories were explored:
As a freelancer, I want to organize and manage my gigs to easily track my progress.
As an organizer, I want to manage group gigs efficiently, organizing schedules and finances in one place.
Cognitive Walkthrough
To address the challenges identified, my team and I initiated a comprehensive approach, beginning with a cognitive walkthrough focused on user experience while navigating through creating gigs and managing finances. This strategic evaluation aimed to enhance the overall usability of GigBoss, particularly in terms of consistency, visibility, and feedback.
Tasks undertaken during the cognitive walkthrough:
Logging in/Signing Up: Uncovering a poor mental model due to the sign-up button's placement at the bottom of the page.
Creating a Group and Adding Members: Identifying poor visibility and feedback, creating a sense of confusion.
Creating a Gig: Highlighting areas of uncertainty in the gig creation process.
Checking for Scheduled Gigs and Invitations: Noting discrepancies in the display of invitations within the Groups tab.
Managing and Checking Group Finances: Discovering challenges in tracking payment progress and summarizing payments received.
Key Findings:
Unclear Gig Creation Steps: Confusion at multiple points during gig creation, hindering the seamless progression through the platform.
Poor Visibility in Group Creation: Visibility issues were identified during group creation, accompanied by unclear language, contributing to a suboptimal user experience.
Sign-Up Process Challenges: The placement of the sign up button lead to a poor mental model, impacting the onboarding experience for new users.
Invite Display Discrepancy: Inconsistency in displaying group invitations, causing confusion about received invitations.
Payment Progress Mapping: Lack of visibility into payment progress and summary, particularly for individuals receiving payments from group organizers.
Navigation Issues in the Bookings Tab: Clicking the “Mark Paid” button in the Bookings tab posed mapping issues, redirecting users to the Gig’s information instead of providing a smooth experience
In response to these findings, design enhancements and feature advancements were conceptualized to create a more user-friendly and intuitive platform. The ultimate goal was to streamline the user journey, eliminate confusion, and foster a positive experience for GigBoss's primary users.
Observations
Contextual Inquiry
Recognizing the importance of understanding users in their natural environment, my team and I conducted a one-hour Zoom session for a contextual inquiry. This deep dive aimed to observe users' interactions with GigBoss, uncovering insights that users might not be consciously aware of during the conventional usability tests.
App Memorability and Learning Curve
One user mentioned that the app felt easily forgettable, highlighting a potential challenge in user retention.
Both users indicated a slight learning curve, suggesting the need for enhanced onboarding or user guidance.
Finance Management on the Books Page
A user expressed uncertainty about how to navigate the finance management features on the Books page, emphasizing a need for clearer instructions or user assistance.
Gig Creation Process
A user stated a desire for a streamlined gig creation process, pointing out that the existing method felt tedious and time-consuming.
The gig organizer expressed the need for flexibility in organizing multiple groups within a gig, outlining a use case where this functionality would significantly improve their workflow.
Visual Cues for Payment Distribution
Users noted a lack of visual cues when assigning different payments to group members, leading to a potential oversight in tracking and distributing funds.
Booking Limitations
Users expressed a limitation in the system, noting that the app did not allow booking more than one group for a gig, restricting the flexibility of organizing larger events.
Participant Profile
The contextual inquiry involved two primary users, both actively engaged in the gig-centric industry. One user represented the perspective of a freelancer who regularly utilized GigBoss, while the other portrayed the role of a gig organizer who managed scheduling using alternative tools.
Affinity Diagram
Following the contextual inquiry, I meticulously documented observations, quotes, and user pain points. These data points were then organized into an affinity diagram, revealing overarching themes such as app memorability challenges, finance management complexities, and desires for a more streamlined gig creation process.
Low Fidelity Prototypes
The insights gathered from the cognitive walkthrough and contextual inquiry formed the foundation for the subsequent designs for the low fidelity prototype. These included simplifying gig creation, introducing visual cues for payment distribution, and addressing the limitations users faced in booking multiple groups for a gig within 6 frames. By addressing these specific user needs, the design aimed to create a more intuitive and user-centric experience with GigBoss.
Final Design Solution
Transitioning from low-fidelity prototypes to high-fidelity designs in Figma, the solutions included:
Efficient Member Addition: Simplifying user input by allowing the addition of all members on one page.
Multiple Groups to a Gig: Providing users the flexibility to add multiple groups to a gig, accommodating diverse needs.
Payment Calculation: Introducing automatic calculation of total payments, enhancing visibility and system status for users.
A video demo showcased the final design to the client, emphasizing improved functionality and a more intuitive user experience. We wanted to bring the prototype to life, helping our client see and understand the proposed design in a tangible form.
1. Desirability Testing
Conduct thorough desirability testing with primary users to gauge their reactions, preferences, and satisfaction with the implemented design changes.
Gather qualitative feedback on the usability, intuitiveness, and overall desirability of the new features.
Next Steps
While the design enhancements aimed to address identified issues, it is crucial to acknowledge that user testing was not conducted due to time constraints. Moving forward, the following steps are proposed to further refine and validate the design changes:
3. Usability Testing
Plan and execute comprehensive usability testing to assess the effectiveness of the design changes in real-world scenarios.
Evaluate the efficiency, effectiveness, and user satisfaction with the revised features.
2. Iterative Prototyping
Based on desirability testing outcomes, iterate on the prototypes to refine any aspects that might require further improvement.
Ensure that the final design aligns seamlessly with user expectations and preferences.
5. Performance Testing
Assess the performance of the redesigned features to ensure they operate seamlessly and efficiently under various usage conditions.
Identify and rectify any performance bottlenecks that may impact the user experience.
4. Accessibility Assessment
Conduct an accessibility assessment to ensure the platform is inclusive and usable for individuals with diverse needs and abilities.
Address any potential accessibility issues to create an inclusive user experience.
What I learned
Through this UX/UI case study, several key learnings emerged:
Importance of Contextual Inquiry
The contextual inquiry provided invaluable insights into user behaviors, preferences, and pain points in their natural environment.
Understanding the users' context enriched the design process by uncovering nuances that might be overlooked in controlled usability tests.
Continuous Iteration and Improvement
Design is an iterative process, and the identification of challenges through cognitive walkthroughs, contextual inquiries, and user interviews emphasizes the need for continuous refinement.
The findings underscored the iterative nature of UX/UI design, with each stage presenting opportunities for enhancement.
User Empathy in Design
Building empathy with users by actively listening to their concerns, observing their actions, and interpreting their needs is fundamental to creating user-centric designs.
The contextual inquiry reinforced the significance of putting oneself in the users' shoes to deliver solutions that truly resonate with their expectations.
User-Centric Decision-Making
The insights gained from user feedback and observations guided decision-making in the design process.
Prioritizing user needs and addressing pain points became the guiding principles for proposing design improvements.