Places4Students | 2024
ux design
Collaborators
Sarika Bhageratty
Rosa Moriya
Tools
Figma
Adobe Illustrator
Duration
7 weeks
PROBLEM
Places4Students is a platform that connects students with rental housing.
Students struggle to navigate the current platform due to a cluttered interface, unclear listings, and a lack of trust indicators.
Students face challenges navigating the platform due to a cluttered interface, unclear listing details, and a lack of trust indicators. The outdated design does not meet the expectations of a modern, student-friendly experience. Additionally, the platform fails to provide a seamless browsing experience across devices, making the housing search process more frustrating than intuitive. For both local and international students already balancing academics, part-time jobs, and the transition to independent living, finding housing should be a stress-free experience—not an added burden.
Our solution?
Redesign of the platform to improve clarity, trust, and
seamless navigation.
USER
Our target audience consisted of international students seeking off-campus housing (Figure 1). Their primary concerns included ease of searching, listing credibility, and a stress-free decision-making process (Figure 2).
Figure 1: Target Audience
Figure 2: Target Audience's Pain Points
We developed two distinct user personas to represent the primary users of the platform: one for students looking for a roommate (Figure 3) and another for those searching for off-campus housing (Figure 4). By understanding their specific goals, frustrations, and behaviors, we created a more intuitive and user-centered experience.
Figure 3: User Persona 1
Figure 4: User Persona 2
Empathy Maps
To better understand our users' needs, frustrations, and motivations, we created empathy maps for both user groups with the aim of creating a seamless and user-centered experience.
For students searching for off-campus housing, the focus was on their need for a stress-free and reliable platform, with concerns about unclear listings, security, and affordability. They seek a straightforward process with verified information to make confident housing decisions (Figure 5).
Figure 5: Empathy Map #1
For students looking for roommates, the emphasis was on trust and compatibility. Their main concerns included finding someone with similar living habits, avoiding unreliable matches, and ensuring a safe and comfortable living arrangement (Figure 6).
Figure 6: Empathy Map #2
PROCESS
Heuristic Evaluation
We conducted a heuristic evaluation using Nielsen Norman's 10 usability heuristics to identify usability issues. Each heuristic was classified and tagged to pinpoint specific problem areas within the website (Figure 7), which helped guide our redesign strategy.
Figure 7: Read our full Heuristic Evaluation report
Style Tile & Visual Identity
By examining the apps and design patterns commonly used by our target audience, many of which featured a clean, minimalist aesthetic, we chose to adopt a similar approach for our design (Figure 8).
For the color palette, we selected distinctive colors that not only set the site apart from other housing platforms like Facebook Marketplace or Zillow, but also conveyed a sense of safety, warmth, and modernity.
Primary Colour: Instead of the traditional blue for trust and security, we opted for a bold, yet sophisticated purple as the primary color.
Secondary Colour: To complement this, we paired it with yellow - a warm, inviting color to evoke a cozy, friendly, and familiar atmosphere for our users.
We also refined the brand identity by simplifying the logo. The previous design felt outdated and did not effectively resonate with our target audience. The new logo aims to create a more modern and student-friendly visual identity that aligns with the refreshed platform, enhances brand recognition, improves readability across different screen sizes, and reinforces the approachable and trustworthy nature of Places4Students.
Figure 8: View our style exploration
USABILITY
User Flows
We designed two distinct user flows to address different needs: one for students searching for off-campus housing and another for those looking for a roommate. By tailoring the experience to these specific user goals, we ensured a more intuitive and efficient navigation process.
1. Finding Housing Flow (Figure 9) : This flow focuses on helping users secure accommodation by providing clear listings, detailed reviews, and advanced search options, ensuring a smooth and informed decision-making process.
Figure 9: User Flow #1 - Finding Housing
2. Roommate Search Flow (Figure 10) : This flow focuses on connecting users with potential roommates.
Figure 10: User Flow #2 - Roommate Search
Low-Fidelity Wireframes
Since we were a group of three, we had to decide how to divide the tasks efficiently. Our solution was not to. Instead of working individually on separate tasks, we collaborated in real time to ensure a collective vision. We hopped on a call and gave ourselves one hour to individually design a low-fidelity wireframe for the homepage (Figure 11). Once the time was up, we presented our concepts, analyzed each design, and selected the strongest elements that best aligned with the project's goals . By consolidating our ideas, we crafted a single, well-rounded homepage that combined our collective insights and strengths (Figure 12).
Figure 11: Individual Wireframes
Figure 12: Consolidated Homepage
The consolidated homepage served as our reference point for developing the rest of the website's low-fidelity wireframes, ensuring consistency across both desktop and mobile versions (Figure 13).
Figure 13: View our low-fidelity wireframes
Usability Test
During the usability testing stage, we collected feedback from four participants and examined their comments within the context of the four main problems identified from our Heuristic Evaluation of the original Places4Students website.
What Worked Well
participants found the redesigned easy to navigate and understood how the site worked at first glance.
participants believed the redesign improved credibility and transparency.
participants found the homepage sections relevant, the tasks easy to complete, and the information useful.
Areas For Improvement
participants were initially confused about where to find the roommate feature and suggested double-parking the link.
participants were confused with certain terms used throughout the website.
