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Touristy

A one-stop solution mobile app for museum and gallery visitors to find, access, and manage audio tours.

Project duration

2022.07-09

Project type

Service Design, Individual

Role

UX researcher and designer

Tool

Figma

The Problem:

There is no “one app” where users are able to find, listen to, and save audio tours for museums and galleries

The goal:

Create an easy-to-use and accessible product for museum and gallery visitors who wish to make the most out of audio tours

Discover

The benefits of multisensory learning have long been tested and validated by scientists. More specifically, it has been found that semantically congruent auditory input can aid visual recognition, and in turn enhance perceptual learning (Seitz et al., 2006). One application of this comes in the form of guided audio tours in informal educational settings, such as museums and galleries - it has been shown that users of audio tours had more positive learning outcomes and reactions than non-users at the same establishment (Riches et al., 2022).

Such evidence provides motivation and a meaningful foundation for the goal of this project: to improve the user experience of audio tours so they can benefit the visitors to the best extent.

Background

User Research

A primary user group is tourists who are interested in but not necessarily experts in art. Another important user group is local residents those who love exploring their cities. Through conducting interviews with 5 participants and building empathy maps, I have discovered the need for succinct and better structured content. Research has also pointed to the need for simpler access to audio tours, retainment of information post-visit, real-time syncing across devices and better accessibility including motion control and language-switching.

User research & empathy map.png

Pain Points

  • structure

Most people visiting exhibitions are not art experts, so they need audio tours to be straightforward and structured in their guidance.

  • access

Different audio tours usually rely on different platforms/websites, require strictly on-site access (such as scanning QR codes) and are difficult to retrieve

  • sharing

Traditional personal-device-based audio tours usually do not allow sharing or syncing

  • language

Audio tours have singular or limited options for language

  • cost

Sometimes renting a device for audio tours costs extra

Building Personas

Define

Considering
IA Principles

From the initial research, I have identified three information architecture principles considered specifically relevant to this project and worth keeping in mind in the design process:

  • Choice principle: When choosing exhibitions and tours, quality is over quantity

  • Disclosure principle: The information displayed of the tours should be expected and necessary

  • Multiple classification principle: Different ways of information-searching should be allowed

User Journey Map - Philip

Philip is a project manager who needs to access audio tours at exhibitions with his

family because he wants to learn more about the art displayed.

Competitive Audit Summary

  • Most current products are individual museum/gallery-based, meaning users can only access audio tours one museum at a time.

  • Most current products are web-based, meaning there is no designated mobile app for audio tours.

  • Most current products only offer on-site access, meaning audio tours cannot be saved for the future (or are hard to find without on-site cues).

Ideating Solutions

How might we make the navigating process as smooth as possible?

How might we make audio tours family/group-friendly?

How might we encourage learning?

How might we provide appropriate information for those not familiar with art?

How might we allow easy switching from one exhibition to the next?

Develop

Prioritizing Features

Taking into account both design principles and user research, the following features are prioritized:

  • Routes: Giving the most concise and relevant route recommendations to users

  • Search: Two ways - by map or by keyword

  • Syncing: Allowing multiple devices to share progress

  • Retrieval: Enabling access to audio tours post-visit

User Flow

userflow.png

Paper Wireframes

Through the drawing of paper wireframes, specific pain points including needs to search for specific exhibitions/artworks and locate them on a map were identified. The refined homescreen on the bottom right addresses these pain points and compiles them into a single interface for easier navigation.

Digital Wireframes

In regards to the home screen, several important factors were taken into account, including the user’s predicted first actions on the app: to either browse or search for a specific destination.

The audio page showcases the picture and text description of the artifact the current audio tour is on. In addition, there is also a button that allows the user to switch languages.

Low-fidelity Prototype

The low-fidelity prototype demonstrates a complete user flow with which a user can find exhibitions, listen to audio tours, and switch languages, among other actions.

Usability Studies

Two rounds of usability studies were carried out where the low-fidelity prototype was tested, which revealed more problems to improve on. 


Round 1 findings:

  • Users want to be able to find tours by museum

  • Users want to be able to access bluetooth from the audio page 

  • Users want a faster and more straightforward way of starting a tour


Round 2 findings:

  • The text area is too small and difficult to read for individual audios

  • Users want to be able to access their favorited exhibitions from their profile page

Read a complete report of usability test findings here.

Deliver

Mockups

Mockups for the app make use of a gentle beige and brown color palette with purple highlights. The reason for this is to make the screen less invading for users with more sensitive eyes.

Refinements

Some design changes were further made upon considering feedback from usability studies, and were included in the high-fidelity prototype.

In the high-fidelity prototype, the description part of the tour on the listening page was changed into an expandable text box to allow for texts of different lengths. 

The user is also able to switch languages from the listening page easily.

Accessibility Considerations

  • The language switching option allows speakers of different languages to access audio tours in the language they are comfortable with

  • The bluetooth option allows syncing of audios across multiple devices, allowing access by proxy so that assistance can be provided to those with impaired or low vision easily

  • The find-tours-by-QR-code function allows easy access to exhibitions from on-site information, making it easier for those who prefer not to or have difficulty typing

High-fidelity prototype

To further improve the product from here:​​

  • more testing should be performed to ensure the quality of user experience

  • more accessibility considerations should be taken into account, including, for example, the addition of motion control functions

Potential
Next Steps

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