UX/UI Review and Enhancement for Wanderlog - Travel Planner- Yakubu Hayim

UX/UI Review and Enhancement for Wanderlog – Travel Planner

Introduction

Wanderlog travel planner is an app that provides easy and intuitive travel assistant services. These include collaboration with other travelers, insight on locations, hotels, restaurants and more. In this document, we will discuss the steps in the user journey from installation to navigating through the features and pages of the app. We will also take a look at how to improve the user experience of the app.

Steps in Using the App

Installation:

Wanderlog – Travel Planner can be installed from the Appstore for Iphone or the Playstore for Android.
Upon tapping the install button from the respective store, the App will begin to download an install on the Mobile.

Welcome Page

The App has a simple welcome page with the display of its logo.
It does not provide a features summary. This simplifies the users task to directly Sign Up/Login with having to skip or walk through the features.

Login/SignUp

The Sign up and login pages are set up in a Web 3.0 style in such a way that users just need to tap on on a contact option (Facebook, Gmail, Apple ID or Email). It then asks for authorization and use the selected contact detail to either log in or sign up.
Facebook is set apart in a more revealing position, to be the primary sign up/Login option. This helps the app to get more users to connect to the very popular social media service that will ease with suggesting friends and connections.
There is “Already have an account? Sign in” option on the Signup page and a “Dont have account yet? Sign up” option at the bottom of the Login page.
Upon signing up, the user will be prompted with one more page to set up a username(there is default collected from the contact they used for sign up). They can also help with an optional answer to the question: “How did you find wanderlog?” This is to collect data that can help with targeted marketing and improvement on platforms that brings in users to the App.

Review of Terms

The Terms of use is presented as a link and users have to open to read it. They agree by continuing, this mean they dont have to worry about ticking a tick box to allow them pass the terms agreement page. However, they can choose to open and read it (haha, it is statistically proven that it is just a negligible percentage of people that reads that)

Subscription

Upon finishing the sign up process, a User will be prompted with annual aand monthly subscription options with a carousel of the free and premium features.
This can help get more initial sales that will help retain users. A user will more likely stay to enjoy what they have payed for. They will also be inquisitive to explore the premium features triggered by the information and direct call to action to make the purchase.
However, users can opt to skip and proceed.

Walk Through

First time users will be prompted with a walkthrough on how to perform every task on the app.
The first is Planning a vacation with minimalistic fields to capture only the necessary information to start a basic trip plan. Users can also see an example of New York.
The trip plan and example will be explained in steps, from map, reservations, Itineraries, and expenditure tracking. It is topped by showing how to explore the walk through again.
There is also a share option which allow users to invite others to the trip plan.

User Data

Users can access their data from the profile and make changes where necessary

Pages Available

Homepage

The homepage presents the user with a search option to easily search for places and plans in the app.
It also lists the users recent plans (an example plan is displayed by default), Some featured travel guides from other users, and some popular destinations.
There is also a bottom nav bar(Home, Rooms and Guests, Add Plan, Deals and Promos, and Profile) that makes navigation through the app easy and it is available in all the main pages of the app.
The Add plan option is highlighted as the main CTA to drive users to make more plans and engage more with the app.

Rooms and Guests

This is where the user select the number of adults, children, and rooms they need.
Then the date and duration of their stay is also selected to help with suggesting available hotels.

Add a Plan

The most complex module in the app, yet very easy and self explanatory.
It asks the user to fill in Location, Date and Invite friends. These are minimalistic fields to capture only the necessary information to start a basic trip plan.
The user will then finish the remaining steps like location on map, reservations, Itineraries, and expenditure tracking.
There is also a share option which allows users to invite others to the trip plan.

Trip Plan Detail Page

This contains the detail of all the activities a user has added to perform as well as expenditure management on a certain plan.
It is sharable and can be updated to user’s taste

Deals and Promos

A list of Deals and Promos that a user can enjoy on their trip
It can contain discounts and offers.
These can be provided in-house or by other services who have partnered with Wanderlog.

Profile Page

It contains the user’s information like image, name, followers.
It also has a list of the plans that a user has made and the Guides they have written/published to help others.
The settings, Membership and Sign out options are also part of the profile.

App Summary

The App has an easy download and install process by just searching for it from the appstore.
The Signup/Login Process is user friendly and innovative by simplifying the task for the user and making it a one click process.
It has a premium plan but a user can also run on the free plan
There is a walkthrough explainer for the user to easily learn and understand the interface
It has a minimalistic home page with very few features like list of plans, popular places and travel guides to keep users better informed about where they are going.
The Add Plan section offers very rich options from locations, plans, flight, itinerary, collaboration and more.

Key UX Design Improvements

The app has a rich navigation and user flow. It is almost UX perfect except for the following:

More Social Apps for Signup: Although facebook is very popular and rightly the primary signup option. The app may be losing out on opportunities as many business minded people are on other platforms. The two I will suggest are Linkedin and Twitter.
Visual Hierarchy: Although a UI aspect of the app, it has so much to do with user experience and influence user behavior. Maintaining consistent sizes for headings and and similar images to set them apart will be a good improvement on the app.
Integration: Integration with popular travel apps like Skyscanner and Expedia can also help boost the user experience.
Revisitable Walkthrough: There should be a way to revisit the first time user walk through. This is because many user are likely to skip it for the first time and later be looking to learn something. The help section is a good resource, but the walkthrough is more intuitive.
The “Travel Guides” can have a page where they can be listed when there are many guides to be presented.
AI is the future: A text based AI tool like Bard or Chat GPT can be integrated into the app to increase it’s interactivity. A notable use case can be when users search for a location that is yet to have a “Travel Guide” available, users can have the option to chat with the AI and talk about the place.

Key UI Enhancements

Here, the improvements in the UI with the reasoning behind them are presented and explained.

The live prototype of the Enhanced UI can be visited and tested here: https://www.figma.com/proto/yjHlavLsAwl9j2aN0Qlb7k/Yakubu-Wanderlog?type=design&node-id=108-1492&scaling=scale-down&page-id=104%3A88&starting-point-node-id=108%3A1309

The design file can also be visited on Figma here: https://www.figma.com/file/yjHlavLsAwl9j2aN0Qlb7k/Yakubu-Wanderlog?type=design&node-id=104-88&mode=design&t=HjoOK6VgJaazDPe7-0

More Social Media Login: As discussed above, this is to get users who have more followers and connections on other social media platforms to easily be on the app and connect with contacts.
Rounded Buttons: The App currently uses circle buttons which tend to look like tags when stacked together. Research has shown that circle buttons perform better with a lot of space around them. They are stacked together on the login/signup page, which discourages conversion. Hence, we turn to rounded corner buttons for better performance.
Brand Color (E5644A) on “Login” and “Signup” call to actions: Although these call to actions are bold, they do not stand out with a clear contrast that differentiate them from the remaining text. Hence, the principle of Clarity is defeated. They stand out more and calls the users attention by having a different color from the rest of the text.
Round corner buttons in app: Why don’t we use the circle buttons even though the buttons have more white space on “Find Hotel”, “Plan Trip” and more pages? This is to maintain a better consistency throughout the app. We want users to relate with the app even from the shape of its buttons. Consistency is a very important design principle and maintaining it will have an important effect on the users.
Consistent Upper Nav: The top navigation now differs with almost every page defeating the principle of consistency in design. Here, I made sure that the Upper Nav in the whole app has a centered title and actions on the sides.
Labels on the Buttom Navigation: No matter how obvious and icon may be, it can mean another thing on a different app. To help with the simplicity and clarity of this app. The buttom navigation is now labeled so that users can clearly know what part of the app they are navigating to.
AI Prompt Tab in Profile: This tab should house the chats that the user had with the AI to get to know places better, in case the places don’t have a travel guide. By doing this, users can keep track of their prompts and visit it again in the future.

Conclusion

The Wanderlog – Travel Planner has an intuitive and easy to use User Experience as well as elegant User Interface. We have reviewed the user experience, explained the details of the app, and suggested some UX improvements.