UX Research and Recommendations
WayScript is a low-code software development platform aiming to help developers and software development enthusiasts create application integrations without the challenges of integration setup. My team and I were asked to analyze this platform to complement their analytics, confirm their assumption that a new on-boarding flow was needed and reimagine this and other features to help increase user engagement and retention.
Roles: UX Designer, Scrum Master
UX Artifacts
Heuristic Analysis
Competitive/Comparative Analysis
Screener Surveys
User Interviews
Affinity Mapping
Usability Testing
User/Task Flows
Fast Prototyping
Site Mapping
Spec Doc
UX Tools
Sketch
Figma
Zeplin
Keynote
Other Skills
Agile
Scrum
Trello
Discovery
Understand the User’s Mental Model
Our first challenge as a team was to understand this platform and how is currently used. Then observe and gather insights from new users to uncover opportunities to ease the learning curve and increase engagement.
Meet the Users
WayScript provided a list of people currently using the platform who were willing to be interviewed for this purpose and we spoke with 4.
Understand WayScript
We then read the documentation to learn how to use it and created an account to experience the current on-boarding flow and also to make our interviews easier.
In addition we did quick reviews of competitors Zapier and tray.io as well as comparators GitHub and Atom.
Understand New Users
In addition we wanted to study how new users perceived the application as well as observe the difficulties found when they first used it. We then conducted a screener survey with people in our network and our colleague’s networks to select software developers who had never used the platform and had some exposure to the technologies managed within it. From 37 respondents we selected 9 to conduct a hybrid user interview/usability test.
We then used affinity mapping and “I”-statements to synthesize that data into key insights that fueled our persona mapping and our later design decisions.
AFFINITY MAPPING
INSIGHTS
Users found value in the marketplace and were interested in the community but overlooked them initially
Users value clean and intuitive design and felt overwhelmed with the layout of the script editor screen; this created a steep learning curve for its functionality
Users do not completely understand the value proposition of WayScript but see potential
Create Empathy by Developing a Persona and a User Journey
Based on this analysis we narrowed down the main issue and and focused on the following scenario.
Chris likes platforms with features that are easy to use and make the application functionally intuitive. She was initially confused with the WayScript site and thought it has a steep learning curve. She does not like overwhelming website layouts with crowded screens or too much text. How might we help Chris find the value in using WayScript to create flows that automate tasks involving application integration?
Based on our research data synthesis we uncovered three strategic opportunities for product recommendations.
Design
Iterate Through Design Studio Brainstorming Sessions
By using whiteboards instead of paper to iterate over our design ideas we were able to speed-up the process. We rapidly made adjustments to our sketches in each iteration and took advantage of having all variations readily available and easy to review to incorporate our favorite features from each others designs.
On-Boarding
We discovered that users were focused on completing the account signup forms and ignoring an application introduction that existed in the same screen. By separating the introduction into its own step we made sure that the users were able to view the application’s value proposition.
We then created a step-by-step walkthrough tutorial of the edit script page to help users familiarize with all its functionality and help them feel less overwhelmed by its rich contents.
Profile Page
The value of the existing profile page was not readily apparent to users and it is not using the available space efficiently.
We changed the profile page to a dashboard that made better use of the screen real estate by showcasing selected content from the Marketplace. In this way the chance of the users missing the Marketplace is reduced and provides a use case that show the value of the system readily available for review.
View Script
The users were confused by this screen and missed the CTA buttons at the top-right corner.
We added a preview of the scripts in the view script screen for clarity and brevity (reduces one click). In response to the users missing the CTA buttons at the top-right corner of the screen we moved them to go under the script preview to keep all related items together organically (as proposed by GESTALT ‘s proximity principle).
Next Steps
Review the terminology/wording within the platform to make sure it is clearly understood
Review the edit script screen
* Narrow panels for modules and documentation
* Change the flow structure to have the trigger outside of “MAIN”
* Change the trigger section to show parallel in addition to
sequential processing
Make module repository customizable
* Set viewable modules number
* Favorites on/off
* List/Mark recently used
Creative Problem Solving
Trust the Process
Olga Patricia Gómez 