V3 Valuation Tool Redesign
Fall 2023 | Industry Sponsored Project
A redesign of Carputty’s vehicle valuation tool to streamline data input, support better decision-making, and provide dynamic visualizations of vehicle value trends over time.
TIMELINE
Aug - Dec 2023
MY ROLE
Main UX Researcher
Literature Review, Competitive Analysis, Survey, Semi-structured interviews, Affinity Mapping, Wireframing, User Testing, Heuristic Evaluation
TOOLS
Qualtrics
MS Office
Figma
Figjam
OVERVIEW
CHALLENGE
The V3 Valuation Tool is designed to empower customers with informed vehicle purchasing decisions, but its current level of customer interaction is limited. Carputty aimed to enhance the tool's features and visualizations to improve its usability and engagement.
SOLUTION
SECONDARY RESEARCH
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS
Our initial step involved conducting a comprehensive competitive analysis of vehicle valuation platforms currently operating within the market landscape. This involved an exhaustive examination of leading websites and applications that offer vehicle appraisal services, scrutinizing their features, functionalities, user interfaces, and overall user experience.
SURVEY
We distributed surveys to reach a broad range of participants and asked participants about their familiarity with valuation tools, rank importance of different values in a car, and kinds of information they readily have available to provide to a valuation tool. We received a total of 25 responses.
CONTEXTUAL INQUIRY & SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEW
We conducted 2 contextual inquiry sessions and 3 semi-structured interviews to gain in-depth understanding of our users
With contextual inqury...we evaluated participants' familiarity with valuation tools and conducted a 45min detailed website walkthrough onZoom, understanding their approach to financing a car.
With semi-structured interview...we assessed familiarity with valuation tools, preferences, and buying/selling contexts. We also explored the role ofpast, present, and future values in purchases
RESEARCH SYNTHESIS
Persona
User Journey Map
Affinity Mapping
DEFINE
HOW MIGHT WE
DESIGN REQUIREMENTS
IDEATE
GROUP BRAINSTORMING
As a group, we engaged in brain dump & SCAMPER to generate 4 different concepts
USER FEEDBACK SESSION
We held a think-aloud feedback session to understand how reliable and intuitive each concept is, uncover any unnecessary or missing elements, and address accessibility concerns
Feedback Notes
CREATE
WIREFRAME
Based on our feedback session, we combined features from each concept to create a low-fi wireframe
HI-FI PROTOTYPE
Access Full Prototype
TEST
HEURISTIC EVALUATION
We conducted expert evaluation with 3 UX experts, where experts evaluated our prototype against 10 Nielsen Heuristics. Evaluators completed a series of tasks in the prototype while filling out Heuristic table and identifying usability issues.
USER-BASED TESTING
We conducted 4 user-based testing sessions in which users completed a set of 10 task scenarios using our prototype. Afterwards, participants completed a SUS questionnaire. While conducting the sessions, researchers kept track of task completion rate, time it took to complete each task, and number of clicks
DESIGN IMPLICATIONS FROM EVALUATION
REFLECT
FUTURE STEPS
REFLECTION
1. Navigating Project Direction with Clients
Working with clients throughout this project made me more comfortable with ambiguous answers and addressing feasibility concerns.
2. Carefully Selecting Research Methods
Because of the nature of our problem space, we realized contextual inquiry was not as useful as other methods we engaged in. Looking back, we could have uitilized our time better by distributing surveys early and recruiting as many people as possible for semi-structured interviews.