Zigway usability testing: How to improve a Burmese FinTech APP prototype

Do you like challenges? I love them!

That’s why I got assigned to Zigway project.

Industry: FinTech

Difficulty level: Difficult

Duration: 5 days

What is Zigway?

ZigWay is a FinTech social enterprise based in Yangon, Myanmar. Zigway provides flexible, affordable loans and subscriptions for everyday goods and services via a mobile application. By putting money back into the pockets of our customers, they give them the peace of mind that comes with financial freedom.

What was the project about?

The project was about usability testing!

Definition

Why needed to conduct usability tests?

The objective of usability tests was to help Zigway test its existing APP prototype, gather findings and insights from users, focus on overarching problems, and provide recommendations for further APP developments and adjustments.

What was the process?

1. I ran a heuristic evaluation of the APP

LEMErS Heuristics from 1–5

2. Conducted WDAC audit and found violations with the following WDAC guidelines:

1.3.2 Meaningful Sequence

1.3.3 Sensory characteristics

1.3.4 Orientation

1.3.5 Identify Input purpose

1.4.8 Visual presentation

1.4.10 Reflow

3.1.3 Unusual words

3. Did research to find more information about Zigway’s target audience.

4. Created persona based on my findings.

Persona

5. Found 9 female from 21–38 years old with lower household income.

6. Conducted 3 tests via usertesting.com

7. Scheduled Zoom interviews that took up to 30 min each and included an introduction, demographic questions, 3 scenarios, and 3 post-test questions.

8. In the beginning of each test, I introduced the objective of the project, asked permission to record the session, and assured them not to worry about making mistakes.

9. Before clicking on anything, I asked users to look at homepage and tell me what they saw and what did they think the APP was for.

Here is the usability test process flow:

Process flow

Respondent’s shared screen

Scenarios/Tasks

I provided each participant with a scenario and asked to complete the following tasks:

1. Your local friend in Myanmar, Ma Phyo Phyo, doesn’t have a phone and asked you to order groceries for her. Use Zigway to create a new order.

2. You want to check Ma Phyo Phyo’s profile and her order history

3. Your friend Ma Phyo Phyo gave you cash for groceries you ordered. Now, you need to digitally collect it and send it to Zigway.

Findings/insights from task 1

1. Your local friend in Myanmar, Ma Phyo Phyo, doesn’t have a phone and asked you to order groceries for her. Use Zigway to create a new order.

Completed: 9

Not completed: 3

Average completion time: 3.38 min

Shortest time: 1 min

Longest time: 8.5 min

• People, who haven’t completed the task, wrongly thought that by clicking on “New order” the first time they’ve completed it. Three users either hadn’t created an order or had been confused by the second “New order” button on subscriber’s profile page. “Clicking on new order twice doesn’t make sense”

Extra step

• 4 respondents expected to see “New order” option on homepage, some were trying to click on “More”
• People who haven’t accomplished the task were carried away by the “Collecting payment” button

“Collect Payment” button is on the left side of the “New Order” button

• Respondents were not clear about photo receipt. They were not sure if they need to take a picture before buying groceries in-store or after

Photo receipt has no instructions

• Users were confused by payment plans because they didn’t see the “Due Today” amount right away
• People were not sure who’s payment plan it is: SuperUser’s or subscribers’ — who is paying?

Whose payment it is? To who?

• Respondents weren’t sure how to proceed to Basket, they hadn’t tried to scroll down, and it took time to find upright basket icon

Users can’t find the “View Basket” button because they don’t scroll down

Findings/insights from task 2

2. You want to check Ma Phyo Phyo’s order history and her profile

Completed: 6

Partially completed: 4

Not completed: 2

Average completion time: 1.7 min

Shortest time: 1 min

Longest time: 2 min

• Users falsely thought that “View order” page is Ma Phyo Phyo’s order history

“View Orders” page is not “Order history”

• Few respondents wanted to proceed to Ma Phyo Phyo’s profile by clicking on her name on “View Orders” page in drop-down orders
• 3 people remembered seeing the subscriber’s profile when creating orders; they thought it was very inconvenient and required extra steps
• 5 users didn’t use the search field to find Ma Phyo Phyo or figured it out later

Users didn’t use the search field immediately

• Had trouble finding order history on Ma Phyo Phyo’s profile

“View order” button is too small

Finding/insights from task 3

3. Your friend, Ma Phyo Phyo, gave you cash for groceries you ordered. Now, you need to digitally collect it and pay it back to Zigway.

Completed: 9

Partially completed: 2

Not completed: 1

Average completion time: 1.1 min

Shortest time: 1 min

Longest time: 2 min

• Users couldn’t figure out two parts/relationships going on the “Payment” page

Two tasks on one page are not visually separated

• One person thought that she finished collecting money after the first page and then thought she was sending it to Zigway when she was still collecting money

What were the next steps?

After completing all three scenarios, I asked users to give their experience satisfaction score and intuitiveness score from 1–5.

Average experience score: 3.5

Average intuitiveness score: 3.8

Then, I created a journey map based on findings and insights gathered from usability tests.

Sandra’s Journey map

Based on the journey map, I started analyzing what were the main pain points, on what stage they were occurring, and what can Zigway do to improve user experience.

What are the recommendations?

General:

• Add prominent call for directionality when users need to scroll
• Put essential buttons at the top
• Keep search bar and labelling consistent
• Create more consistent font size and color hierarchy, add space between lines, and make the pages less wordy and more structured
• Change color palette, as people didn’t like dark yellow color for buttons. One respondent called it negative
• Add more icons and images
• Update the user flow to reduce extra steps

Homepage:

• Create the “New order” button on homepage
• Efficiently organize the page, add the most important buttons, and make it less wordy

Order process:

• Change the “Collecting payment” and “New order” buttons order
• Add instructions for specific functions. For example, make the purpose of “photo receipt” more clear
• Clarify the payment process

Subscribers:

• Make search field more distinct and filters more convenient to use.
• Add drop-down options to find a subscriber instead of manually typing it
• Make it available for users to proceed to subscriber’s profile page from the “View Orders” page by clicking on subscribers’ names
• Make the “Order history” button bigger and more distinct

Payment page:

• Make two part of the “Payment” page visually distinct or create two different pages for each task

Limitations:

I believe users had trouble interacting with the prototype and couldn’t find relevant information due to the lack of prototype interactions and the limited number of shown pages. Also, the information was not consistent throughout the process and confused most of the respondents. If I had a fully developed APP, I would conduct a usability test again and compare findings. I believe the results would be different.

The whole project took 5 stressful days, but that was very rewarding in the end. I’ve got valuable insights and was amazed by how different people were thinking about the same things. In the end, it was a fantastic experience and lesson.

The process is as important as outcomes.

Thank you for your time!

Happy UX Designing!

Nastya Kvak