Prototyping & Iterating - Booking Engine
Iterative user testing to significantly improve the booking experience, making it much easier for users to find and modify room selections and ancillaries.
Situation
WLH's website was built on technologies that had become increasingly unreliable and slow. In Phase Two the focus was on improving the booking process: specifically, allowing users to more easily find and modify their room selections and ancillaries according to their specific needs.
Task
Lead the UX design for the new booking engine. That meant understanding user pain points, aligning design with business objectives, creating and testing wireframes, and ensuring a clean handover to the development team, all while adapting to a mid-project rebrand.
Actions
Research & Analysis
Gathered detailed information on user pain points by analysing call centre data and Qualtrics surveys, highlighting the need for users to easily discover and modify room choices and ancillaries. Conducted a competitor analysis to identify key industry features and innovations.
Stakeholder Engagement
Engaged with key stakeholders to align the project with business needs and objectives, ensuring design solutions addressed both user and business requirements.
User Journey Mapping
Mapped the entire user journey and restructured the information architecture, incorporating fresh design thinking to make it easier for users to find and modify room options and additional services. Continued developing the design and component library from Phase 1.
Design & Testing
Created initial wireframes and conducted rigorous user testing, focusing on how easily users could move through, select and modify room and ancillary choices. Iterated on designs to enhance usability; refined wireframes were presented to stakeholders and developers to establish project timelines.
MVP Development
Reworked the wireframes to create a stripped-back MVP, ensuring the core feature of easy room and ancillary modification was front and centre while planning for future enhancements.
Handover & Prototyping
Facilitated a smooth handover of all UX wireframes and artefacts to the development team, and created prototypes for post-MVP features, user-tested so the booking engine would continue to evolve based on user needs.
Adaptation to Rebranding
When the business underwent a complete rebrand mid-project, updated all in-progress wireframes to align with the new brand identity and developed digital brand guidelines focused on accessibility.
Result
The booking engine reached the final stages of pre-release and was scheduled for delivery in Q4 2024. The iterative, user-focused approach led to a product that significantly improved the booking experience, making it much easier for users to find and modify their room selections and ancillaries, which keeps WLH competitive in a competitive edge in the market.