OPTIMIZING FOR MOBILE CONTEXT

When Agoda have decided to strategically move into the growing market of non-hotels accommodations, all of a sudden we had to support a new type of users — hosts who listed their properties in our system.

LIke hotels, Agoda Homes hosts users needed to have an easy way to manage their properties and view the lists of received reservations. But unlike hotels, it was crucial that hosts will be able to get this information on the go using their mobile devices.

In this project we focused on optimizing the experience for the reservations list on the Agoda Homes app.

With each card packed with details that are necessary for hosts in different states and contexts of the reservation,

we needed to design an experience that could easy the task of reviewing and acting on incoming reservations by creating clarity and efficiency for users to find what they need, whenever they need it.

Define

THE TASK

In this project I’ve been tasked to redesign the experience for the reservations screens to accommodate users needs by clarifying the state of each reservation, and find opportunities to drive for more engagement from hosts side.

My role was to make sure that the flow, logic and information architecture suited users needs and pain points within the context of their experience on Agoda Homes mobile app.

Discover

CHALLENGES

There are so many details that can go under a reservation card.

Our main challenge was to enhance the information architecture, making the card easier to scan at a glance and find necessary details within the relatively small real estate of a mobile screen.

We also wanted to emphasize the main call to action for each state of the reservation.

Different users have different needs, but we wanted the cards experience to focus on the majority of users — making sure needed information is available for them at any time, with a clear call to action on what to do next.

Early sketches and exploration of concepts

The real challenge in designing for mobile applications is which and how much information should revealed to users at any stage of their task.

Develop

SOLUTIONS

Analyzing collected quantitative and qualitative data, we observed a pattern of users behaviors which lead us to the conclusion that although the reservations stages were different, hosts were consistently looking for similar information, yet the hierarchy of the type of information they were looking for was slightly different.

In the final solution we designed an experience that is based on the same card structure for each one of the states:

• Request reservation
• Confirmed reservation
• Departed reservation

Each card is divided into 3 sections plus a clear call to action that is relevant to the stage of the reservation.

That way we could organize the information in a consistent and easy to scan way that helped hosts reviewing their reservations on the go.

By discovering users needs and pain points within specific contexts we can design useful and useable applications.

Design

RESULTS

Once implemented, we observed an increase in user interactions with the reservations screen, with more actions that are being taken.

This lead to making sure that each reservation is handled quickly and efficiently which in consequence enhanced the users experience for travelers by getting quicker responses from their hosts.

THE TAKEAWAY

Consistency is not just a good practice of design, it is a way to make sure users always find what they need when they need it quickly and in the most efficient way.

Consistency helps reducing the user cognitive load and enable them to perform their tasks and accomplish their goals efficiently and fast.

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