Rumble
A modern redesign of the Yelp interface, for a younger generation
Embedded Files
Tools
Figma, Qualtrics, Miro
Methods
Conceptual Design, Wireframing, Paper Prototyping, Persona Building, Low-fidelity & Medium-fidelity Prototyping, Piloting, Cognitive Walkthroughs, Usability Testing, Observational Studies, Survey, Coding sheets, Task Examples
Date
September 2023 - December 2023
Project Overview
Intersections between the food industry and technology have led to increased websites and applications for users to find, rate, and review businesses. One of these is Yelp, a popular publisher for crowd-sourced reviews that was founded in 2004. However, new generations require new engagement strategies, and as individuals who often use online reviews to help inform our own decisions, my team and I wanted to challenge ourselves to redesign the Yelp interface for a younger generation. This led to the creation of Rumble!
Rumble Log-In Page
Isolating Our Problem
We initially conducted an online observational study to analyze how users typically interact with the current Yelp interface to better inform our redesign. We asked participants to share their screen and had them think-aloud while completing common tasks (finding a certain restaurant, posting a review, etc.), then we had them complete a System Usability Scale (SUS) survey to quantitatively measure their thoughts on the Yelp interface.
After analyzing and thematically coding our data, we found 3 key areas of improvement:
efficiency, relevancy, and novelty.
The Design Process
First, using the findings of our study, we brainstormed and isolated requirements we wanted to prioritize in our new design.
List of Requirements on Miro
We then idealized various conceptual models, but ultimately opted for a combination of an AI concierge and a 'dating app' experience, in order to provide more tailored information for the user, with reduced clutter and an increased entertainment factor.
Conceptual Model Brainstorming on Miro
AI Concierge Conceptual Illustration
The Prototype
A medium-fidelity prototype of Rumble was then created through Figma, with the following highlighted features:
A homepage with three ways to search for businesses: a search bar, a map function, and an AI chat helper named Bosco for personal, tailored suggestions
A rapid search result page that allows for fun, quick, and easy browsing of business options, via swiping mechanisms similar to dating apps
A traditional search result page with a filter function, for manually changing the results of a search inquiry based on a user's preferences
Restaurant home pages with simplified and accessible business information, for more efficient browsing, decision making, and reviewing
Home Search Page
Bosco Response Example
Swiping Page
Traditional Browsing Page
Individual Restaurant Page
Restaurant Review Function
What About It's Usability?
After the initial prototype was completed, we piloted and conducted a usability study on our prototype in order to measure its functionality, efficiency, and intuitiveness. To triangulate our data, we decided to implement an observational study to see how participants interacted with Rumble, as well as a System Usability Scale (SUS) survey to gain their quantitative judgement of the app.
Our results showed that while there were processes and functions that were quite intuitive (e.g. the review function, the swiping mechanism), there were also key instances where participants needed guidance (e.g. toggling between browsing pages, understanding the functionality of buttons). This showed us that there are still major improvements needed for our initial design, that we overlooked. But overall, the prototype was met with positive feedback, with users reporting an enjoyable, user-friendly experience with the Rumble interface.
Challenges We Faced
One difficulty was that we underestimated the time needed to implement all features of the application. We were not able to implement some pages of the prototype thoroughly, which ultimately resulted in increased frustration and confusion in our usability test participants. This was seen most when interacting with Bosco, where interactions were predetermined, and trying to accessing individual restaurant pages, which were incomplete.
Another obstacle we encountered was maintaining a reasonable, measurable scope. While we wanted to be faithful to Yelp in our design, we had to isolate which of its features we wanted to highlight, as Yelp has so many diverse features it provides. Adding all of them would have been overwhelming and unreasonable, so discussing what we wanted to focus on proved a challenge.
Balancing intuitiveness and clarity in our design was also quite difficult. We wanted to simplify the design and user-experience of the app, and we assumed that our participants would automatically understand the features we implemented. This led to our prototype lacking clear explanation or iconography, thereby instilling additional confusion in our usability test participants about the function of some buttons and toggles.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse