OLD GOLD

UX deliverables

• Competitor Analysis
• User Research - Personas + Customer Journey Map
• Information Architecture
• Wireframes
• Prototype (Axure)
• Test - recruitment and usability tasks

The competitors analyzed were chosen based ontwo criteria:

1. Apps with the same purpose (trade things/services). Average people usually don’t know thoseapps. Therefore, TradeMade and Swapub wereselected due to the ease to find on Google.

2. Websites/apps that were the most mentionedand used by people interviewed - Marketplace andGumtree

Heuristics compared were Look and Feel, PrimaryAudience, Secondary Audience, Posting and fidingan item, extra features, generative user content,categories, website, social media and newsletter.

After this analysis, it was possible to identify someaction points:

• To the app to stand out among the others, it hasto speak differently to the user. It’s crucial thatthe user feels that there is a purpose beyondselling and buying things.
• Keep up with a simple and straightforwarddesign. However, the app needs to havemediation over the photos displayed by users.Besides, completed descriptions and detailsneed to be mandatory for posting an ad.
• The visual organisation is essential.
• The users must find easily any product bysearching or sorting by category, location, price,and others.
• Buyers must easily chat with sellers to havemore information about the product.

Over one week, interviews were undertakenthrough the qualitative method with 7 participants(3 women and 4 men) from different countries.The goal was to gain insights into their behaviours,attitudes, and thoughts. All interviews were carriedout face-to-face and tape-recorded. Their agesrange from 23 to 34 years old, some married andsome single.

The questions were related to the following topics: buying or getting free second-hand stuff, selling second-hand stuff, donating, trading, and delivery/pick up experience. Those questions varied according to the respondents’ answers.

All interviewees were sellers and buyers, so theyhad both views about the two sides. However,they’re considered separated personas due to abetter organisation of the content to be analysed.

• Users want to get rid of things as faster possible.
• Users prefer to sell things rather than to giveaway when they’re in good condition.
• The visual organisation is essential.
• Students usually are the target that looks forcheap furniture.
• Users don’t trust in second-hand electronic stuffunless it’s from friends.
• Some users are only interested in second-handstuff if they are unique or vintage.
• Users usually think first if their friends will beinterested in acquiring the thing they want to get rid.
• Users think that big and old stuff is usuallyharder to sell or get rid.
• Users get platform recommendations from friends when they want to sell or buy second hand stuff.

• Users don’t know many places to donate things.They usually rely on parents, or they remember of the Salvation Army.
• Delivery is the biggest problem for sellers and buyers. Users end up buying things through websites that sell new stuff because they know that the delivery is covered up. Buyers give upon buying second-hand stuff when they don’t know how to pick it up.
• Buyers think that they always have to be in charge of picking up. However, sometimes the seller is available to delivery.
• Photos influence the platform look and feel. Users think that the platform is more trust worthy if there are more photos of product sin good condition.
• The price of delivering second-hand stuff can’t be as high as the product.
• Users don’t like it when a product doesn’t have the main information, and they have to ask the seller.

• The app will have different resources, such as photo retouch, tips to make the ad appears on top, promotions to the seller reach the potential buyers, etc.
• Although the app will focus on giving away and swapping things, the selling option will be allowed.
• The app design will be appealing to young people who usually are students and have less money. The app will be based on apps that young people are used to, such as Snapchat, Instagram, and others.
• The app will have a particular category for products that are vintage and probably more expensive.
• The app will have a way to connect to the users’ friends. They will be able to offer the products directly to them or create a group with only friends.
• The app will try to ease the connection of the buyers/sellers to the people who would be interested in earning some money helping to delivery or disassemble things.

• The app will provide different ways to share the app with friends.
• Charity places, such as NGOs, will be able to post their necessities and be in contact with users who want to donate things.
• The app will make it easier for users to have a range of delivery/pick-up possibilities.
• The most appealing advertisings will be highlighted on the app. This feature will influence people to display better photos and descriptions.
• The app will have the option to notify people who have a car or bike (according to the size of the product). This feature will help the buyer/seller to deliver or pick up items — a similar method as Uber.
• The seller won’t be able to post an advertise if they don’t fulfil all the requirements related to the product information.

In this section, a prototype was developed focusing on the main app features - to sell, to buy, to swap, and to donate things.

Afterwards, the app was tested with 5 people from different countries and ages. They were required to try to complete 3 tasks.

During the process, the user actions were recorded.After analysing them, it was possible to see repetitive mistakes and misunderstandings in some features.

It was found that the app needs changes to some labels, reset of some page layouts, and some buttons aren’t clear enough. For those reasons, not all tasks were able to be completed without help.

The average of users well understood the task processes. Still, the donation process needs to be reviewed and have more steps included, although it was easy to complete. It raised questions and doubts about how it would work.