Forever 21

Usability Report

Course: HCI 460- Usability Evaluation Methods

Team Members: Vicky Moreira, Gelayol Moradzadeh, Mauli Shukla, Frank Sweis

PROJECT SUMMARY

We evaluated the Forever 21 Android application based on real world scenarios that its users face and generated a total of 11 findings. The scope of our research was the user’s experience browsing, searching, sharing an item of clothing, and finding the closest Forever 21 store near by. In particular, we wanted to answer the following questions:

Can users navigate the application easily to search and buy (add to bag) clothing?
How many taps and/or screens does it take for users to perform the outlined tasks (such as buying clothing)?
What are the major usability flaws that:
- Impede users from purchasing an item?
- Impede users from finding a Forever 21 store?
- Impede users from sharing an item on Pinterest?
Are users satisfied with their interactions with the application when searching and buying clothing, exploring styles, finding stores, and sharing on social media? (data will be gathered through the wrap-up questions)

As a result, we created specific tasks for our participants to address these questions. We created a test plan with defined objectives and research question to determine the strengths and weaknesses of the application.

OBJECTIVE

Our main goal was also to identify the application’s strengths and assess how the application could be further improved to better meet the needs and expectations of its users.

METHODS AND PROCEDURES

To explore the usability issues, my team and I prepared a test plan that defined our objectives and also framed our research questions in a way that would help us identify the strengths and weaknesses of the application. We also defined our target participant, evaluation measures, the tasks for users to perform, and possible questions that could be asked before and after the usability test session.

In order to conduct the test, we first created a moderator’s guide, which included a consent form, introduction, and a series of tasks to keep all team members on track during the test sessions.

We conducted a total of 6 tests with both male and female participants that were between the ages of 25 and 45. They each performed the following tasks:

Browse for an item on the app
Prepare item for purchase
Scan barcode using scan feature
Share an item on social media
Find information of store closest to user

Within each task, we decided to note:

Quantitative measures such as the number of taps or screens taken to accomplish a given task.
The number of errors or challenges users encountered while completing the tasks. We predefined errors to be when users navigated to the wrong screen, mistapped an element on the application, asked for help, or were unable to accomplish a task.
User’s level of satisfaction and the level of difficulty they encountered using questions on a Likert scale.
Comments, feedback, and answers to wrap up questions that specifically asked how they felt at certain points through the tasks and overall what they liked and disliked.

By conducting the usability evaluation sessions, we found out that all these issues triggers frustration and dissatisfaction with using the application in the user. The most common problems that were observed were unresponsiveness and slowness in the application the difficulty of finding the closest Forever 21 store.

VIEW ALL FINDINGS

POSITIVE FINDINGS

NEGATIVE FINDINGS

We found three major positive findings in the application:

As soon as the user gets to the shopping page, adding to cart is an easy process
Icons used in the application are very intuitive
Important elements are not hidden behind multiple screens

Some issues were also found during the usability evaluations. The major issues are:

Application has a slow speed.
Application does not have proper scaling in some pages of the app, which makes it difficult for the participant to obtain information with ease.
Users do not notice the “shop” button easily which causes to miss some of the products available in the application.
There is no quick way on home page to access shopping and searching features, which slows down the user in reaching the wanted page in the application.
While scanning a barcode, there is no feature to help focus barcodes properly.
No feedback or message is provided to the user to inform the users when they have successfully shared and posted items on their social media successfully.
Two map buttons are available on the application for locating other Forever 21 stores.
Location results are in random order causing users to scroll in order to find the closest store.