Overview
The Guestbook is the world’s first cashback hotel loyalty program that rewards members for booking direct at over 800 of the best independent and boutique brand hotels in major travel destinations around the globe.
With the users’ experience in navigating the Guestbook website and mobile application in mind, I consistently investigated users’ experiences and opinions on platform navigation improvement to implement the recommendations. Three versions of the Guestbook landing and search pages (i.e., 2, 2.5, 3) have been evaluated so far.
NOTE
Please note that only a few parts of the projects (i.e., questions, findings, and recommendations) are shared to ensure compliance with The Guestbook NDA.
Sample Tasks and Questions
Q1: Please take a quick look at the homepage and tell us what is your first impression of the homepage? Is there anything that stands out to you?
Follow-up: Can you talk about the visual design—like the photography, colors, or typography?
Q2: How would you describe the brand based on this page? What gives you that impression?
Q3: Please tap on Explorer Hotels at the top of the page. Please look up hotels in LA, select any dates, don't change the currency or filters. What are your thoughts about this page? Is there anything you find unclear or missing?
Q4: Now, by moving the map around, please state how many hotel partners The Guestbook have in the DC area?
Follow-up: Now you see card lists on the left. What stands out to you on these cards? What do you think the stars might represent?
Team
Number of Team Members: 6
My Role: Principal Researcher
Method and Analysis
Research Method: Qualitative
Research Design: Usability Testing
Data Collection:
Tool: usertesting.com
Main study: 10 participants
Data Analysis:
Affinity Diagramming
Key Insights
1- Participants think that The Guestbook target market is more focused on:
2- Participants really liked the calculator on the home page to see how much cashback and cash forward the can earn based on their spending. However, Participants were confused about the meaning and details of the cash forward concept.
3- The design of the home page is not accessible-friendly (visually impaired)
young target market
leisure-oriented travelers
sun and beach destinations
Recommendations
The design is not accessible-friendly for visually impaired people, and changes need to be made to ensure that the colors and writing are visible and readable for everyone.
We need to display a variety of destinations on our website. Currently, the vibe is all about sun and beaches, although some people are interested in fall and winter destinations.
The Cash forward and Cashback should be clickable links, directing potential members to the corresponding FAQ section.
Since we are not only focused on leisure travelers, we need to diversify the images we have placed on the home page. We need to make sure that we show a combination of pictures featuring both business and leisure travelers.
Impact
A seamless user experience is critical for creating trust, satisfaction, and loyalty, particularly in a competitive industry like travel and hospitality. It ensures users can intuitively navigate the platform, leading to higher satisfaction and increased conversions, and engagement. With this in mind, through iterative usability evaluations of three versions of the Guestbook landing and search pages (2.0, 2.5, and 3.0), I investigated user experiences and opinions on platform navigation to identify pain points and opportunities for improvement and implemented actionable recommendations that reduced friction, streamlined navigation, and improved overall usability.
Sample Quotes
Age
“Seems like, I guess people wanna see thin young people, but not everybody's thin and not everybody's young. So kinda stands out to me.”
Calculator
“Can I test this up? Okay, so if I spent $820 Oh wow. Okay. I, I think this break is actually really cool to just see how much can be earned. So I feel like it's really helpful kind of like seeing those two connected and I feel like the cash forward just sounds like super intriguing”
Sunny Vacation
“People laying under the sun is nice and is one of the thing you think of going on vacation”
“feel like the pictures of homepage don’t show anything and all your pictures are based around the water so it only speaks to one particular group of people and not me because I don’t like beaches.”
Accessibility
“I would maybe not have this such a dark color in front of the picture so you could see the picture a little bit better. This needs to be a little bit darker because it's hard to read that. Um, and I know that could just be me. I happen to be visually impaired.”