Hotel and Resort Company

Challenge

An international hotel and resort company wanted to evaluate the current state of booking path performance and user experience on their websites and mobile applications in Brazil and China.

The client was concerned with dropout rates in the booking paths of the Portuguese and Chinese sites as well as overall impressions, localization, and usability of current designs in these markets.

Additionally, there were new design concepts that required feedback for the Chinese market.

User Centric Approach

User Centric was engaged to execute global research in Rio de Janerio and Shanghai.  One-on-one usability tests were performed in each location with interpreters providing English language translation in real-time to observers.

Usability tests included tasks on the website and mobile sites.  In China, the tests also included feedback for design concepts.  

Result

These sessions were rich with participant feedback on impressions and preferences and offered User Centric the insight necessary to provide actionable recommendations as well as uncover unexpected user errors.

For each country, User Centric was able to present recommendations about local booking preferences, expectations, improvements for booking pages, search features, and information architecture changes for specific pages.  Our team was also able to suggest ways to improve the localization of each site.  (i.e., how to “Make it more Brazilian”)

While evaluating participant feedback, User Centric exposed why participants struggled or were confused with certain features and suggested ways to improve.  Changes included small font modifications to more dramatic ones that involved the way search results were displayed.

The sessions conducted in both countries afforded the client invaluable data that not only addressed their objectives but also revealed user errors that were having a devastating effect on user experience.