SOLUTION

A business website that allows clients to book appointments online will decrease booking conflicts and promote business growth.

Online appointment booking process increases client convenience

  • Customers can book with ease at their own pace whenever and wherever

  • Eliminates the inconvenience associated with making phone calls, waiting for responses, and potential scheduling conflicts

  • Streamlines the scheduling process, benefiting both customers and the client

Online platform increases business growth

  • Reviews boost new customers’ trust and confidence in the services provided

  • Showcasing a gallery of haircuts allows clients to view desired results, increasing the appeal of the services

INITIAL RESEARCH

64% of people prefer booking haircut appointments online.

l surveyed 42 people from ages 23 to 56 and 64% indicated a preference to book haircut appointments online over phone calls. These results align with the trend observed in recent years, where an increasing number of businesses are adopting online platforms alongside their physical locations to facilitate booking appointments.

COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS

Customers gravitate towards simple booking processes and business transparency.

Looking at successful barbershop websites, I evaluated what worked well to create a positive customer experience. Customers are attracted by user-friendly booking processes and businesses that keep it open and honest.

I found that successful websites:

  • Have a clean UI with eye-catching hero section and clear copy to draw attention to the business

  • Have an intuitive and easy online booking process with clear CTA buttons directing customers towards booking appointments

  • Are transparent with customer reviews and photos

  • List services with pricing so people know ahead of time how much they can expect to pay

USER INTERVIEWS + INSIGHTS

I interviewed 5 relevant participants about their experience with going to and booking appointments at barbershops.

I wanted to learn and understand from a customer’s perspective...

  • How they decide which barbershop to go to

  • Their preferred way to book appointments

  • A positive/negative booking experience

To dive deeper, I asked customers these research questions...

  1. The last time you went to a barbershop, how did you decide which barbershop to go to?

  2. The last time you booked an appointment at the barbershop, how did you book your hair service appointments?

  3. What is the hardest part about making hair service appointments? Why?

  4. Tell me about a time when you had a positive experience booking a hair service appointment.

  5. Tell me about a time when you had a negative experience booking a hair service appointment.

STORYBOARD

How online booking increases efficiency for customers and the client.

QUESTION FOR DESIGN

How might we create a website with a user-friendly and intuitive online booking feature with transparency that increases customer ease and trust?

DESIGN

Sketching with the users’ needs and intuitive design at the forefront of my approach.

Following conversations with my interviewees, there was a unanimous expression for a streamlined online booking process and importance of business transparency. While sketching out the low-fidelity wireframes for the website, I prioritized these features at the top.

1. Landing page

2. Appointment booking process

3. Reviews and services page

USABILITY TESTING (FIRST ROUND) + MAJOR IMPORVEMENTS

4 main improvements were made based on user feedback

1. Increasing customer reviews transparency

2. Resolving confusion between “About Us” vs “Contact Us”

3. Clarifying service page interaction confusion

4. Displaying visuals to showcase service quality

STAKEHOLDER FEEDBACK + COLOR THEME REQUEST

The client was super happy with the updated design, but requested the color theme to be black, white, and cream.

Upon the client's request for cream as the main color, I explored different ways to incorporate it into the design, mindful of its lighter hue and the importance of maintaining design accessibility.

During heuristic evaluation, the combination of cream and white failed accessibility, while cream and black passed.

I implemented cream as a background color, ensuring that it complemented the design without compromising legibility. This resulted in a positive direction on the project.

USABILITY TESTING (SECOND ROUND) + MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS

A final round of usability testing with the high-fidelity design was performed to validate the changes.

2 final changes were made to improve the experience of the online booking process.

FINAL PRODUCT

REFLECTION

The best design decisions aren’t the easiest to execute.

This project taught me that the best design decisions often come with their own set of challenges. In particular, this project, which marked my first real-world experience working with a client, presented unique hurdles. Explaining design choices to a stakeholder who has limited design knowledge initially felt daunting. Nevertheless, backing up my design decisions with supporting research data, I was able to establish trust with the stakeholder and deliver a promising design solution.

WHAT’S NEXT?

With the presentation of booking times, some users favored a single-column approach while others preferred a division of the times into morning, afternoon, and evening slots. Given more time and resources, the next step in this project would involve conducting A/B testing with a larger pool of users to determine which design yields the optimal user experience.

PROBLEM

Garden State Barbershop faces limitations in the appointment booking process due to lack of an online platform resulting in frustration for both the customers and client.

Garden State Barbershop currently relies on phone calls and texts for booking appointments, resulting in delayed responses and scheduling conflicts which frustrates both customers and the client.

Garden State Barbershop

Website design | UX client project | 4 weeks