Case Study: Homepage Research

Project Description

Phase 1: Persona Two Dashboard Concept Test and Discovery Research
Before I joined the team, a UX consultancy identified three primary personas and create wireframes for a dashboard for each of these three personas. When I joined the team, they were ready to build out the dashboard for the second persona. I was asked to do proof of concept testing with users who aligned with our second persona. I also convinced the team to include some time for generative user interviews to ensure that we understood what was most important to these users before going into the POC testing.

Phase 2: Persona Two Dashboard and Homepage Customization Usability Test
In the interview portion of the first phase of this research, we learned that customization was the highest priority for this user group. In particular, having a home page that could be customized to fit the needs of the individuals in different roles on their team. The team shifted to focus on customization, and we did a round of testing with users across all of our personas for customization and the dashboard we tested in the first phase.

Phase 3: Persona Three Dashboard Design Sprint and Testing.
For our third persona, we were tasked with determining a dashboard that would fit their needs effectively. We reviewed the existing research and interviewed subject matter experts before going into sketching and rapid prototyping, which we then tested with users.

Phase 4: Homepage Customization Usability.
We learned in phase three that our third persona wasn't a meaningful persona. Everyone we spoke with had different needs and wanted to be able to customize. Instead of creating a specific dashboard for the third persona, we created a fully customizable homepage that would eventually replace the homepage and dashboards for the other two personas as well.

Contribution 

For each of these phases, I led the team to come up with research goals and scope the project. I created a research plan and moderator guide. I recruited all the participants either through direct outreach or through partnering with with an external recruitment company. I conducted the research sessions, analyzed the results, shared these results with the team, and continued to direct the team's focus to implementing what we learned.

Impact 

Overall, this work helped the team move from a focus on persona-specific dashboards where each user would need to select from three, pre-defined options to a more open and customizable homepage. This new approach enables users to choose a default set-up or decide for themselves what is most important to see on their homepage.

Phase 1: We were able to determine that the intended dashboard for Alicia users was useful, but not necessarily the most important thing for them to see immediately after logging in. We learned that, as leaders, these users were more concerned with seeing a dashboard that could be customized to suit the needs of everyone on their team based on their responsibilities. This resulted in a shift in prioritization. While we had learned about the need for customization and it was on the roadmap, this feedback from users in leadership positions at their company allowed us to prioritize that work earlier than expected.

Phase 2: For this second phase, we did a usability test for both the Alicia dashboard and an initial prototype for a customizable home page. Because we tested with a broader group of users across all three of our personas, we were able to learn that the historical trending visualization created for Alicias was actually useful for other users as well. This was determined more by the team size and structure rather than job role. We were also able to make important changes.

Phase 3: We continued learning about our Linda users. We determined that there wasn't a dashboard we could develop that would meet the needs of our Lindas, and instead committed to fully focus on customizing the dashboard.

Phase 4: Our follow-up testing on the fully customizable dashboard proved out the value of this functionality and helped us determine future options for customization that we could add to provide additional value.