EXTRA CREDIT
An End to End Responsive Ecommerce Site
Background
Extra Credit is a fictional boutique clothing store targeting a trend forward audience looking for quality, style conscious pieces for any occasion. They offer a new curated selection each season along with fashion staples. Originally only brick and mortar, they want to expand to ecommerce and offer their customers a cool, convenient, and easy way to shop for the best pieces of the season and year round favorites.
Challenge
Design a responsive e-commerce site for Extra Credit that is cool, style forward, and easy-to-shop to give users a positive online shopping experience; thereby increasing sales, return and new customers.
Process
Empathy > Define > Design > Prototype > Test > Iterate > Reflect
Extra Credit is a fictional boutique clothing store targeting a trend forward audience looking for quality, style conscious pieces for any occasion. They offer a new curated selection each season along with fashion staples. Originally only brick and mortar, they want to expand to ecommerce and offer their customers a cool, convenient, and easy way to shop for the best pieces of the season and year round favorites.
Challenge
Design a responsive e-commerce site for Extra Credit that is cool, style forward, and easy-to-shop to give users a positive online shopping experience; thereby increasing sales, return and new customers.
Process
Empathy > Define > Design > Prototype > Test > Iterate > Reflect
Role
UX / UI Designer
Interaction Designer
UX Researcher
Tools
Figma
Maze
Zoom
Duration
80 hours
UX / UI Designer
Interaction Designer
UX Researcher
Tools
Figma
Maze
Zoom
Duration
80 hours
1. EMPATHY
The research goal is to gain market and user knowledge in order to better understand what is working and not working, so Extra Credit can best provide users with pleasurable shopping experience they want to return to.
Objectives
- Understand motivations and pain points for stylish users in order to grow customer base
- Identify what factors make an ecommerce experience feel trendy and fashion forward
- Identify how to organize a diverse amount of inventory effectively for an easy shopping experience
Process
- Competitive Analysis
- User Interviews
Competitive Analysis
In order to gain insight into competitor websites, I compared 3 trendy boutique and direct-to-customer ecommerce sites and 2 fast fashion sites for design patterns and brand feel.
- Online retailers greatly benefit from a strong visual message and site organization
- Personalized experiences and direct to customer models increase brand loyalty and memorability with customers
- Upscale + specialized boutique retailers lean on a strong brand identity: either a very clean UI or a fun but trendy UI; they have this freedom since they tend to carry less product
Provisional Personas
I also mapped out a few provisional personas for each competitor to better understand the type of users are being targeted with these design and brand choices.
User Interviews
I conducted interviews with participants who were regular online shoppers with disposable income. They also had some degree of interest in style and investing in clothing since this would be the main target customer for Extra Credit. I was looking to learn about their buying habits, ecommerce experiences, and core beliefs about clothing brands they liked and disliked.
- Method: combo of in person and remote via Zoom
- Participants: 6
- Age: 20 - 34
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Experience: Regular Online Shopper
User Findings
- Looking for a trustworthy brand and shopping experience
- Liked when experience felt personalized and curated for their tastes
Findings
- Like to feel like they were making informed decisions about the product
- Wanted to easily find products they liked or were looking for
User Persona
To help guide the design process, I created a persona based the research findings that users want a personalized brand identity they relate to, with e-commerce experiences they trusted, quality products, good customer service and an easy functional digital platform.
