at home far away - travel site

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This is a spec concept design for a travel site. It includes a design brief, interaction model, personas and user scenarios based on user interviews and ethnographic research.

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Page 1: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

1

Page 2: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

Design Brief 1-2

Ethnographic Study Results 3-8

Personas 9-14

Interaction Model 15-18

By: Susan Oslin

August 2009

Table of Contents

“At Home Far Away” Travel SiteConcept Design Studies

Page 3: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

Target Users

• Male & Female

• Although the stores are based in Southern California, the website will now be open to all U.S.

• Users that will use the site frequently and “spread the word” to network of family and friends

• Can afford to purchase the products

• Frequent travelers that will actively use the “travel advice” and will hopefully purchase often

• Active users that will help generate site content for “rating & reviews” + help populate the “travel advice”

Business Goals

“At Home Far Away” is a company that has 10 boutiques throughout Southern

California, established in downtown San Diego in 1992, they’ve expanded to

several boutiques in the San Diego region and Orange County, finally opening 2

new boutiques in Los Angeles this past year.

• The company sells travel books & unique, high-end travel accessories (bags + misc. portable products) that “ease” the travel experience.

• They want to now create a website that would allow them to do the fol-lowing:

• Sell directly online their products

• Allow for customers to locate their physical stores and contact them through email and phone

• Provide online content around travel advice (including travel tips, spe-cific destination guides for hotspots around the globe, recommenda-tions for tour groups and travel agents)

• Allow customers to rate and review products, contribute content as part of the “travel advice”

• Allow customers to create and mange an account on the site where they can view their purchase history, profile information, wishlist and “tagged” site content for future reference (like a vacation spot article or travel tip)

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 2Design Breif

Design Breif

Page 4: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

SusansHeilaMike

Vern/Fran

CharlenNancy/Mike

BartLouise

Joey

Findings:

Exploratory travelers that traveled the most preferred to deal with real human beings when

researching and booking. Travel rewards that included perks to make travel more comfort-

able were important to this group and a big incentive on what travel services they chose.

Task based travelers rely heavily on the internet for research and booking and carry hand-

held devices with internet access. They too are motivated by rewards programs, but tend

to focus on frequent flier miles and financially based incentives.

Exploratory travelers who use the internet were a lot were more interested in reviews, blogs,

and online communities. Task based travelers tended not to be interested in online com-

munities.

Email as a primary form of communication ranked high for all types of travelers and internet

users.

Response Key

Overview:

Travel took on two distinct types, what we will call exploratory travel and task-based travel.

Exploratory travel was purely leisure or adventure travel for vacation purposes, usually to

somewhere the traveler had not been or was not familiar with and a lot of activity was

planned. Task-based travel had a specific purpose, such as business, or visiting family and

generally the traveler had been there before, was familiar with the destination, and gener-

ally wasn’t planning a lot of extra curricular activity. Consequently the findings of these two

groups were charted separately as the trends tended to differed between the groups but

tended to be similar within the groups.

Lessons Learned:

To do the type of comparison that follows, establishing trends and patterns, requires a well

defined set of questions and consistency in the interviewing process. It was only after a

number of interviews had been taken was it clear the type of data that would be most useful

to collect. Therefor, this study can only be used for qualitative research and only a few very

broad generalizations can be made. This type of qualitative research is great for gathering

ideas and helping to define the problem and project parameters, but no real quantitative

data can be gathered.

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 4Survey Results

Ethnographic Study: Survey Results

Page 5: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

Internet Shopping

Internet Leisure

Internet News

Internet Social Networking

2-3x/wk daily more than 8hrs/day

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

Primary Preferred Method of Communication

Secondary Preferred Method of Communication

Handheld Device

text email face to facephone

text email face to facephone

phone only phone/text/photo iPhoneblackberry

Internet Banking/Financesnever rarely nearly all online occasionally often

Internet Usage2hr/day 4hr/day 6hr/day

Primary Travel Research Method

Secondary Travel Research Method

Method of Travel Preparation

Preferred Method of Purchase for Travel Gear

Travel Gear

Desired Functionality

personal network agent/service literature

laptopaccessories clothing/comfort

blog

hand held w/ internet

fashion weatherprep. articles

or video

Travel Frequency: Exploratory

Travel Duration: Exploratory

1x/1-2yrs 1x/yr 2x/yr 6x/yr 12x/yr

2-3days 1wk 2wk 3wk 4+wks

online

personal network agent/service literature online

reviewsactivities planning photo sharingrewards

in store agent/service phone online

store travel store airport online

kindle

Method of Travel Bookingagent/service phone direct online direct online portal

S

S

S

S

S

S

H

H

H

H

H

H

H

H

H

N

N

N

N

N

N

V

V

V

V

V

V

V

V

V S SS SS

S

S

S

S

S

S

S

S

H

H

H

H

H

H

H HH

H

HHHH

N

N

N

N

V

V

V

V

V V

V

N

N

N

N

NNN NN

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 6Survey Results

Ethnographic Study: Survey Results - Exploratory Travelers

Page 6: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

Internet Shopping

Internet Leisure

Internet News

Internet Social Networking

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

never rarely nearly all online occasionally often

Primary Preferred Method of Communication

Secondary Preferred Method of Communication

Handheld Device

text email face to facephone

text email face to facephone

phone only phone/text/photo iPhoneblackberry

Internet Banking/Financesnever rarely nearly all online occasionally often

Primary Travel Research Method

Method of Travel Preparation

Preferred Method of Purchase for Travel Gear

Travel Gear

Desired Functionality

personal network agent/service literature

laptopaccessories clothing/comfort

blog

hand held w/ internet

fashion weatherprep. articles

or video

Travel Frequency: Task-based

Travel Duration: Task-based

1x/1-2yrs 1x/yr 2x/yr 6x/yr 12x/yr

2-3days 1wk 2wk 3wk 4+wks

online

reviewsactivities planning photo sharingrewards

in store agent/service phone online

store travel store airport online

kindle

Method of Travel Bookingagent/service phone direct online direct online portal

H

H

H

H

H

H

H

H

M

M

M

M

M

M

M

B

B

B

B

B

B

B

B

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

H

H

H

H

H

H HH

H

HHHH

M

M

M

M

M

M

M M M

B

B

B

B

B B

B

L

L

L

L

LH

M B

L

L LLL

LL LHM B

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 8Survey Results

Ethnographic Study: Survey Results - Task-Based Travelers

Page 7: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

Barriers:

• Complex interfaces that try to do too much can be overwhelming and frustrating. They expect the site to help them clarify their travel planning and the process to be easy.

• Excessive graphics, media, animation, moving parts, anything per-ceived as too fancy (complicated) makes them uncomfortable.

• Inconsistencies between the in-store and online experience.

Profession: Retired CPA and HR administratorIncome: mortgage paid, $96kAge: 65 and 70

Attributes:

• The internet is a compliment to their primary research through their personal network and agents. They like interacting with real people and want that same kind of feel online whenever possible.

• If traveling somewhere new they are likely to speak directly with an agent, however are more likely to book directly online when traveling to a familiar place or cruise line.

• They are very knowledgeable about traveling and need less information than they do ways to make traveling more comfortable or luxurious. They are highly motivated by finding the best deal and the best deal means the best overall experience, not the lowest price.

• To purchase a travel guide, luggage, or other travel gear they are more likely to purchase in the store directly. They will go to the site to browse, review and price compare, put prefer to touch and feel for final purchase. In-store incentives to visit the site are important.

• Staying connected to their loved ones is important and having internet access for email is a requirement to any travel experience.

Frank and Delores are lucky enough to travel around the world nearly

50% of the year. They own 5 timeshares and are ‘Elite’ Princess cruisers. Twice a year they take a 3-4 week vacation

to a distant land or a 2-3 week cruise. They take monthly jaunts for a week or so to resorts in the states as well as

abroad by trading in points from their time shares. Seasoned travelers, they expect to be rewarded for their loyalty.

Service, perks and pampering are key to these old world travelers with traditional values.

Triggers:

• Simple interface, not too many options or details. Choices and processes should be clearly delineated.

• Lots of opportunity to build rewards points with a clear indication of how to do so and what the benefits are.

• Easy way to make comparisons between product offerings and how their offerings compare to competitors.

• Profound level of customer service, the experience of being taken care of and knowing that ‘At Home Far Away’ is one step ahead and providing what they need before they have the need to ask.

• Frank and Delores are planning a 4 week vacation to tour Italy. They’ve booked a package for a portion of the trip through the American Express affiliates at ‘At Home Far Away’ via phone and now want to begin plan-ning their their solo excursions.

• To simplify the online experience, the phone attendant has already cre-ated their account for them and has even confingured some of the basic fucntionalilty according to their preferences. A welcome email has been sent with all the relevant details including a direct customer support num-ber should they need additional assistance.

• They come to the site to first verfiy their itinerary and check the status of their travel awards account.

• Both locactions offer suggested links to related interests such as travel gear, articles and reviews, points of interest near their destination and upcoming scheduled events at the store.

• Delores sees an announcement for a packing seminar and follows that link. The packing seminar is held at their local store, but on an evening when Frank has a conflict.

• Frank sees that the event will be recorded and available online at his leisure and requests to have an email reminder sent to him when the ses-sion is ready for review online.

• Delories decides she would like to go and mingle with other traverlers. She reserves a seat and selects to have an email reminder a few days prior to the event. They both earn awards points for participating.

• Now they decide to browse the books for a travel guide to Italy. They see that there are hundreds to choose from and and glad that like minded travelers have left reviews, and that the store has a reccomended reading list.

• After reading some of the reviews and investigating the traveouge of several of the reviewers, Delores still has a few questions.

• She connects to the online chat and engages in a delightful exchange with a young woman who was just in Italy last year. Delores now is con-fident in her book selection and has also decided to purchase a rail map as suggested by the service agent.

• After Frank and Delores have spent some time with their materials they look forward to returning to the site to purchase their rail pass and earn additional rewards.

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 10Personas and Scenarios

Persona: Retired Jet Setters

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Barriers:

• Same old same—she wants something a little special, thought provoking—a unique experience.

• Poorly organized content that is not well tagged, hard to find, hard to get back to.

• Superficial marketing messages, over sell and hyped up content.

Profession: Sociology ProfessorIncome: $85k/yrAge: 47

Attributes:

• Katherine is an information junky, and wants to be an expert on the area she is traveling. She wants to know not only the best lodging, restaurants, and sight-seeing, she wants to immerse herself in the culture and live ‘among the people’.

• She will spend hours on end researching and digging for authentic cultural experiences outside of the tourist routes. She relies heavily on the writ-ings of like-minded people and is happy to take the time to share her experiences.

• Although the internet and technology play an important part of her daily life and in the preparation for the trip, she travels light and wants compact, unobtrusive gear. She’s willing to bring technology with her if it enhances her experience, but not to stay connected to her daily life.

• One who immerses herself in everything she does, Katherine will happily go to the store for purchases and talks, and is equally happy shopping and viewing online. There is as much joy in the planning of the trip as there is in being on the trip so she spends months researching, preparing and planning her trip and looks for as many avenues as she can to absorb information.

• In addition to the scholarly papers she publishes, she is happy to share her insights and experiences with the travel community and writes articles both on and offline. She is also an active contributor to the live presentations at ‘At Home Far Away’.

Katherine, a single mom with a grown son, is a sociology professor at UC San Diego. She

teaches the Fall and Spring semesters and has her summers off. Every summer she takes a 4-6 weeks to explore a

new culture. Although Katherine may spend a portion of her time on an organized tour, she is adventurous and wants

to experience the culture as natively as possible and looks for alternative lodgings and ways to explore. She trusts

her peers and looks for real people sharing their actual experiences. As a scholar she respects the advice from the

experts, but prefers travel advice from those that have ventured off the beaten path.

Triggers:

• Katherine wants to be stimulated and gets excited about planning a trip, but not in any kind of superficial way(excessive media, anima-tion)—simply the allure of a far away culture will draw her in. The mystic of travel is important.

• She wants lots of content and information about the best way to prepare, as well as the destination and culture itself.

• Access to additional resources that ‘At Home Far Away’ is not able to provide is valuable and appreciated.

• A robust community both online and offline. As a single woman Katherine enjoys connecting to the community and would appreci-ate a way to network with other single travelers.

• Well organized content presented in easily digestible levels of de-tail.

• The Fall semester is starting up and Katherie wants to finish docu-menting her recent trip to Africa. She logs into her account to update her travelouge. There are several reviews she wants to write about guides she hired and tucked away treasure they brought her to.

• When she finishes her reviews and uploads some of her photos, she pokes around the travelouge to see where other travelers have gone and learn about their experiences.

• There are a few like minded adventure travelers she has met through this service and she likes to keep up on their recent posts. Ken is cur-rently in Peru and Katherine becomes intrigued by his posts. She does a search for Peru to see what other travelers have to say. Some pretty interesting people and excursions are found, she tags and save them to her favorites.

• Peru is sounding pretty good for next Summer’s trip. She moves over to the affiliates section to see who has excursions to Peru. Overseas Adventure Travel has a backpacking trip to Machu Pichu that includes an optional Amazon River tour. These are tagged and saved to her favorites.

• Using the context sensitive sidebar external links, she goes about researching Machu Pichu and the Amazon River.

• Getting very excited now, she goes back to ‘At Home Far Away’ and searches for camping, hiking, and canoe/kayak equipment. She sees that both Ken and several others have reccommended a resaonably priced all weather sleeping bag.

• Too early to make purchases for next years trip, she tags and saves it to her favorites. Remembering that her friend Alex is preparing for a 2 week river rafting trip down the Colorado river, she sends him a link to the sleeping bag and invites him to create a profile so he too can share his adventures.

• Before leaving the site, Katherince submits an application to give an in-store presentation on preparing for safari.

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 12Personas and Scenarios

Persona: Scholarly Explorer

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Barriers:

• Stodgey, boring design and static content.

• Barren community content, lack of community participation.

• Difficulty in retracing steps, or retrieving previously viewed or tagged content.

• Anything that is perceived as time consuming or not immediately obvious.

Profession: Marketing DirectorIncome: $120k + bonusesAge: 32

Attributes:

• It’s important for Daniel to stay abreast of advances in technology and to be active in online communities. When he finds a useful site or application he likes to exploit it completely and share it with his communities—to be the first, most, best, biggest, etc.

• He expects sites to be smart, data driven, and for technology to be taken advantage of. If data is collected in one place and useful in another, he expects there to be a connection. An unsophisticated use of technology is a turn off, he won’t be impressed and likely not to engage.

• As the marketing director, he is expected to be the one in the know at his company and people look to him for information, so he likes to share in real time his travel experiences—outcomes from business meetings, conferences, etc. Consequently and out of habit, he also enjoys sharing in real time his personal travels with friends and family.

• With such a busy schedule Daniel has little time to do research when planning travel. He wants information to be centralized, his findings stored and easily accessible when needed.

Daniel, engaged to be married to Fiona, is a marketing director for an advertising agency. He travels

for his business two to three days a week, one to two times per month. An early adopter, Daniel is always looking for

the next best thing in everything he does. If he could, he’d put his whole life into his iPhone, so is always looking for

iPhone apps to make his life easier. He and his fiancé, an international installation artist, are always on the go so stay-

ing connected while mobile is critical. If they can’t take it with them, it’s of little use. Daniel also travels abroad several

times a year in support of his Finona’s installations.

Triggers:

• Use of best practices and current trends i.e. ‘smart’ forms, auto complete searches, cross referenced tags between areas within the site, and pulling of live data from other sources where appropriate.

• Sleek, smart, forward thinking design, not just visually but also the experience and interaction.

• Use of mobile apps to enhance the site experience.

• Ways to gain recognition in the community and ease of sharing with friends within and outside of the ‘At Home Far Away’ com-munity.

• Daniel just got out of a client meeting in Manhattan. • If traveling somewhere new they are likely to speak directly with an agent, however are more likely to book directly online when traveling to a familiar place or cruise line.

• They are very knowledgeable about traveling and need less informa-tion than they do ways to make traveling more comfortable or luxuri-ous. They are highly motivated by finding the best deal and the best deal means the best overall experience, not the lowest price.

• To purchase a travel guide, luggage, or other travel gear they are more likely to purchase in the store directly so in-store incentives to visit the site are important. They will go to the site to browse, review and price compare, put prefer to touch and feel for final purchase.

• Staying connected to their loved ones is important and having internet access for email is a requirement to any travel experience.

• The internet is a compliment to their primary research through their personal network and agents. They like interacting with real people and want that same kind of feel online whenever possible.

• If traveling somewhere new they are likely to speak directly with an agent, however are more likely to book directly online when traveling to a familiar place or cruise line.

• They are very knowledgeable about traveling and need less informa-tion than they do ways to make traveling more comfortable or luxuri-ous. They are highly motivated by finding the best deal and the best deal means the best overall experience, not the lowest price.

• To purchase a travel guide, luggage, or other travel gear they are more likely to purchase in the store directly so in-store incentives to visit the site are important. They will go to the site to browse, review and price compare, put prefer to touch and feel for final purchase.

• They are very knowledgeable about traveling and need less informa-tion than they do ways to make traveling more comfortable or luxuri-ous. They are highly motivated by finding the best deal and the best deal means the best overall experience, not the lowest price.

• To purchase a travel guide, luggage, or other travel gear they are more likely to purchase in the store directly so in-store incentives to visit the site are important. They will go to the site to browse, review and price compare, put prefer to touch and feel for final purchase.

• Staying connected to their loved ones is important and having internet access for email is a requirement to any travel experience.

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 14Personas and Scenarios

Persona: Savvy Business Traveler

Page 10: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 16Interaction Model

Findings:

Exploratory travelers that traveled the most preferred to deal with real human be-

ings when researching and booking. Travel rewards that included perks to make

travel more comfortable were important to this group and a big incentive on what

travel services they chose.

Task based travelers rely heavily on the internet for research and booking and

carry hand-held devices with internet access. They too are motivated by rewards

programs, but tend to focus on frequent flier miles and financially based incen-

tives.

Exploratory travelers who use the internet were a lot were more interested in re-

views, blogs, and online communities. Task based travelers tended not to be

interested in online communities.

Email as a primary form of communication ranked high for all types of travelers

and internet users.

Introduction:

The site is designed based on the initial business goals and the subsequent re-

search to back those goals. In order to reach the business goals of developing

a strong community and active use of the site to promote sales, certain offline

characteristics were determined necessary. Our research concluded there are

two main types of travelers, exploratory, and task-based. Exploratory travelers

and more likely to develop a strong relationship with the site. These travelers still

rely heavily on various travel agent services and real person interaction. Conse-

quently we felt that affiliations with these types of services and strong ties to the

in-store experience would be key in developing loyalty.

Features:

Merchandise

Trip Planning

User Account

Travelogue

Mobil Application

Page 11: At Home Far Away - Travel Site

‘At Home Far Away’ Travel Site 18Interaction Model

Interaction Model

Mobile App

Overseas TravelAdventure

Rail Pass

Amex Travel

Webcasts*In-person*

*

TravelCompanion*

ExcursionReviews

*

Trip Planning

MemberSubmissions*

How-to/Tips Articles

and Videos

ExpertTravel

Articles Affiliate TravelPlanning Services*

PresentationCalendar

Shipping

Returns

Security/Privacy Policy

Customer Service

Live Chat

Internal LinksRelated Content

External LinksRelated Content(aggregated and

filtered RSS)

Shopping Cart

Context SensitiveNarrowing

Auto Suggestw/ photos

Staff

ContactCareers

AboutStore Locator

Sizing Guide

AttributeRanking

RateReview*

Sort by:datebest

worstuseful

MerchandiseReviews

*

Clothing

RecommendedReading

*

Accessories/Gear/Gadgets

Specials(clearance)

Books,Maps andTravel Guides

Merchandise

FeaturedItems

Photos

Blog/Tweets

Recommend: Restaurants

HotelsActivities

Travelogue*

Itinerary

Rewards

TaggedContent

WishListOrder History

and Tracking

My Account

GlobalSearch

FeaturedMemberTraveler

FeaturedArticle

SearchTrip Planning

SearchTravelogue

SearchMerchandise

atHomeFarAway.com