Aquatics Empowered

Client

Aquatics Empowered connects patients needing aquatic therapy to swimming facilities that are available for use. Patients are able to view and book reservations at available facilities. Facility owners can make their pools and spas available to patients interested in participating in various levels of aquatic therapy.

Challenge

Evaluate the usability of the website, identify areas for improvement, propose recommendations in the form of an interactive wireframe to the development team.

Research - Heuristic Evaluation

How do patients use this site? What are their goals? What makes the website difficult?

Before we could evaluate the website our team populated the site with fictional facilities and patients. We sketched out some initial user goals, then we performed a heuristic evaluation to find usability patterns to inform our usability test plan.

Determining user and business goals. Oh, hey this is easy!

OK, harder than I thought.

Patient's Goals

I want to schedule an appointment with a pool
I want to create an account.
I need to manage my account and reservations.

Business Goals

Create connection between users and facility owners.
Promote wellness.
Make money.

Current Site Flow

Personal Thoughts: Our team was initially disheartened by the large amount of issues with the site that first day. Dozens of times the site would appear to stop working and provide zero feedback. I was worried that we wouldn't be able to walk a user through the website during usability testing. Also nobody on the UX team had any experience with Aquatic Therapy. The idea that hotels and apartments rent out their pools was unfamiliar. We had a problem with empathizing with the users.

User Testing

Write a script, then walk users through the process of using the website to gather data.

User Testing Script

Moderator Checklist

Patient Scenario

1. You recently had hip replacement surgery and your doctor recommends you participate in a low impact exercise, such as swimming. You’re looking for a time slot next week. You would prefer to exercise in the morning, in a quiet place, and near The Mall of America (zipcode 55425) where you work. Show me how you would do this on the website.

2. You later decide that time slot does not work for you. What would your next steps be?

In-Person Usability Testing

Remote Usability Testing

Data Analysis

The team's data is complied, then synthesized. Was the hypothesis correct? What are the easy fixes? What are the trends? How can we make this site easier?

Team date was compiled using Trello.

Synthesis

Let me get real...

Personal Note: This part got ugly. I started the day excited to put all of my data into order. After an hour of dragging around Trello notes I'd lost the plot and was exhausted. It was frustrating arranging all of the Trello notes. I didn't have time to handwrite all 200 cards and got distracted imagining inventing a Post It Note printer. With Post Its you can use both hands and it feels more natural.

I realized that my group should have decided upon standard terms for each webpage, form, and menu. Because we hadn't, I was reread every note and guessing where the user was in the flow. Also if we had the time I would have liked to go back and delete duplicate notes. My inexperience with Trello isn't entirely to blame. During the synthesis stage I kept trying to throw a net over the entire site, find the one thing that would solve everything and I couldn't.

What's missing from the my report is the third scenario. My team and I asked participants to also pretend they were a facility manager, but I'm not including it in the scope of my report. This is for several reasons: First, the business owner requested we primarily focus on the patients. Second, though the facility website frustrated every participant we tested, they all were able to complete the task flow. Third, honestly the facility page is death by a thousand paper cuts. There are so many little problems that break web conventions and standards that a frontend developer would see them from a mile away.