● Description: UX Research
● Platform: Desktop Website
● Timeline: SEP 2022 - OCT 2022
Objective: The primary goal of this project is to evaluate the usability of the National Geographic desktop website and identify potential issues, or paintp points, according to Jakob Nielsen's usability heuristics. The project proposes design solutions for future redesigns.
Problem: Though the National Geographic desktop website boasts attention-aware systems and a minimalistic design, it suffers from usability issues related to user control, consistency & standards and efficiency of use.
In Sample 1, users were tasked to subscribe to a magazine while interacting with the National Geographic public website. Potential pain points were identified related to satisfaction, efficiency of use and memorability when interacting with certain design elements. The examples highlighted include a homepage screen with redundant CTAs, demonstrating the use of the same button in three different locations on the same screen, and bottlenecks related to cataloging and payment processing.
In Sample 3, users were tasked to stream a video on the website. The process flow was visualized into a diagram wherein pain points were annotated. The task prompts the users to enter and interact with the streaming services of National Geographic. Users verbalized some difficulty with this task, specifically with regard to site navigation. Users can enter site pages and, unbeknowst to them, be redirected to an external site. This affects the overall user experience as participants were unable to return to their page of origin causing some frustration.
Sample 3 illustrates a wire flow wherein users are prompted to seek content on a specific topic. This task encourages the user to interact with the site's search function. Users verbalized some difficulty interacting with the search feature as a lack in search refinement or the ability to filter search results made finding information on specific topics difficult. There were also critical comments about the search results page and the card layouts on the page as users verbalized difficulty distinguishing search results based on type of media or historical data, like the date the content was posted.
This heuristic evaluation of the National Geographic website utilized Jakob Nielsen's ten usability heuristics to conduct a comprehensive quality assurance analysis. The evaluation aimed to identify usability issues across the entire public site, focusing on navigation, content presentation and user interactions. Key findings highlighted areas for improvement in efficiency and accessibility, all while reducing user errors and improving the overall user experience.
