Polina Fiksson

October 2019

Squarespace Studio

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Skills

App Design

UX/UI

Product Design

User Research

UX/UI

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Challenge

Problem

Squarespace Studio is a stand-alone app that enables users to discover and book a professional photographer for showcasing their product photography on their personal Squarespace site. Full Case Study

Insight

Through research I learned that people are often overwhelmed with a number of photographers to select from. The most important criteria for them is work examples, price and reviews. Also, business owners prefer to have a more detailed discussion with a photographer before making a decision to book.

Solution

A native mobile app that allows business owners to post a job and get qualified proposals. Users can compare them to pick the perfect match, communicate directly with the photographer, and manage the job from booking to receiving finished assets and making a payment, all in a single location.

Process

To get the project started and to inform my process, I did research: studied websites and apps for booking product photographers, read articles on hiring product photographers to understand the nuances of the industry, distributed the survey among multiple groups of entrepreneurs and interviewed people who had the corresponding experience. I learned that they prefer to search for pros on their own, but often feel overwhelmed with a selection. It is important for them to be able to ask questions and be in control of the process. I identified 2 user groups with significantly different motivations for using the product: Product Owners and Photographers, but for this project focused on the former only. To gain a better understanding of the entire process, I mapped out the customer’s journey and made a list of tasks the customer needs to be able to complete to use our product successfully. This allowed me to think about different flows and identify interactions the product needs to support.

Design System

After sketching ideas and wireframing, I created hi-fi prototypes in the style of other Squarespace apps. The brief has a lot of questions, and to make it less overwhelming I broke it down into multiple shorter, more manageable steps and introduced a progress bar to help users feel like they are making progress towards an end goal to keep their motivation high. The tab bar contains the core functionality available to rapidly switch between screens with one tap. The card with an offer has all relevant information telling the user if this pro is a good match. Images are in the very center to grab attention. In the detail view we present more work examples loud and clear. The quote and actions are fixed at the bottom of the screen. There are multiple ways for users to contact a candidate for more details before they decide to book. They can track the progress, evaluate finished work and pay for the order. To improve on my design I would conduct usability testing sessions and iterate.

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