Application Design / Project 2 : UI/UX Design Document
21/5/2025 - 25/6/2025 (Week5-Week10)
Amber Tan Jing Jing (0372746)
DST60504 / Application Design I / Bachelor of Design in Creative Media
Project 2 / UI/UX Design Document
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Lectures
2. Instructions
2. Project 2 (UI/UX Design Document)
3. Feedback
4. Reflection
LECTURES
Week5/ Introduction To User Experience Research
1. What is UX Research and Why It Matters
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Understand users' behavior, needs, and emotions.
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Good UX helps improve sales, user satisfaction, and brand value.
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UX is not just about looks- it’s about making sure the product truly works for users.
2. The 5 Steps of UX Research
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Define the goal
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Create Hypotheses
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Choose Methods
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Conduct the Research
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Synthesize Findings
3. Qualitative vs Quantitative Research
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Qualitative= Understand why (e.g., interviews, observations)
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Quantitative= Understand how many / how often (e.g., surveys, data)
4. Common UX Research Methods
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Interviews- Understand deep thoughts and feelings.
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Surveys- Get quick feedback from many users.
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Usability Testing- Find out if users can use the app easily.
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User Persona- A sample profile that represents your users.
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Card Sorting- Helps organize app content in a logical way.
5. Benefits of Good UX
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For Product Teams- Better design decisions, save time and effort.
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For Users- Fewer frustrations, more satisfaction.
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For Businesses- Saves cost, increases loyalty, and improves profits.
6. Avoid Leading Questions
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Ask neutral questions like:
✅ “How do you feel about this feature?”
❎ “Is this feature hard to use?”
Week6/ UI/UX Design Document- User Persona
1. Introduction
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State the purpose of the document.
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Define the target users.
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Write a clear problem statement.
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Identify UX and UI weaknesses in the current app.
2. User Research
- Use survey and interview to collect real data.
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Create at least 3 user personas based on research.
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Show a user journey map (steps users take).
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Explain how research influenced your design choices.
3. Information Architecture
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Use card sorting to organize content.
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Show the information architecture map (structure of app).
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Create a user flow chart to show navigation.
4. MVP Features
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List all planned features.
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Highlight which features are part of the MVP (Minimum Viable Product).
Week7/ User journey map
1. What is a User Journey Map?
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A visual timeline that shows the steps a user goes through to achieve a goal.
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Includes user actions, emotions, touchpoints, needs, and pain points.
2. Why is it Important?
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Helps us understand user behavior and feelings.
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Identifies pain points and moments of frustration.
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Guides us in improving the user experience and product design.
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Gives the design team a clear direction.
3. Basic Steps to Create One:
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Define user persona, scenario, and goal.
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List stages of the journey (e.g., Discover, Plan, Book, Travel, After Travel).
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Add user actions at each stage.
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Include:
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Touchpoints (e.g., app, website)
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Needs & Pain Points
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Emotions
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Possible Solutions
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4. Tips for Making It:
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Always refer to your user persona.
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Be specific about user thoughts and feelings.
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Use tools like Canva or Miro to draw the map.
Week8/ MoSCoW and 2x2 matrix
This week, Mr Sylvain taught us the MoSCoW and the 2x2 matrix and we applied them to decide which app features are most important.
Week9/ MoSCoW, 2x2 matrix and user flowchart
This week, Mr Sylvain reviewed the MoSCoW method and 2x2 matrix again. He also showed us examples of how to create a user flowchart.
Week10/ Sketching
We brought pencil and paper this week to sketch app layouts in class. Mr Sylvain gave us limited time to draw different screens.
INSTRUCTIONS
PROJECT 2 (UI/UX Design Document)
Description:
After we decided on our app idea, we moved on to UX design. This document helps us understand what users need and how to make the app easier to use.
Instructions:
- Determine and verify their target audiences.
- Outline the content element of their app, and exercise card sorting method to achieve optimum information architecture.
- Listing the app features and identifying the application Minimum Viable Product (MVP).
- Create wireframes for main screens
- Plan the user interaction and interactivity (Flow chart)
Week5
This week, we conducted interviews. We needed to interview 5 people to get first hand user experiences. I started by interviewing my friends via Zoom. Below are some screenshots of the sessions.
Week6
This week, we used the 5 interview transcripts and organized the data into affinity map using sticky notes in Figma to group similar user insights and identify key themes. From these themes, we created 3 personas to represent different types of users.
Week7
This week, I finalized our personas and created a user journey map.
Week8
I finalized the opportunity areas and organized them into sticky notes for the MoSCoW and 2x2 matrix.
Week9
This week, I completed the MoSCoW and 2x2 matrix using all the feedback and data I gathered so far.
Week10
This week, I continued with my user flowchart to show the full process of how users redeem points and coupons.
FEEDBACK
Week5
- Avoid asking designer focused questions like “What do you think about the font?” These are not suitable for regular users or shoppers.
- Focus your questions more on the user’s real experience, not specific features of the app.
- The goal of the interview is to explore user feelings, habits and problems, not to test app features.
- Include comparison questions to understand what users like or dislike such as "What other apps have you used, and how do they compare to MyNEWS?"
Week6
No feedback
Week7
- Focus on what users want from MyNEWS itself, not on app features or design details.
- Don’t highlight app crashes or technical issues that designers can’t control.
- Show different user lifestyles and needs.
- Each persona should have a unique shopping goal and pain point to distinguish them clearly.
- Persona2 can be like he rushed to the store, the burrito was sold out, but because she pre-ordered, she still got it.
- Each story should feel different. Another one can be she saw the toy car promotion online, wanted to buy it for his grandson, but went to many stores and couldn’t find it. Staff didn’t know where it was available, and in the end still no car.
- Current idea is too straightforward, needs more creative or engaging elements.
- Add new features not currently in the app to improve user experience.
- Rewards should appear in more fun and noticeable ways (e.g. pop-up, animation).
- Placement of rewards or suggestions should be clear (top, middle, or bottom of screen).
- App idea is standard and functional, but lacks excitement or uniqueness.
- Add more fun, surprising or playful features to increase engagement, like "spin the wheel" rewards system.
- Bring in features that make people want to share or recommend the app to others.
- Research and get inspiration from creative ideas or trends used in other apps.
REFLECTION
Experience
Through this project, I slowly learned how to improve the app by understanding the user experience. This project took quite a few weeks, which felt really long. From doing interviews, to creating personas, to figuring out how to design better to solve their problems. It was a long process. But through that, I got to see how important user needs are when designing an app.
Observation
During the interview, I learned things from others that I didn’t notice before. In my Project1 proposal, the problems I found were mostly design and technical problem. But after asking users about their experience, I realized that some of their struggles were things I never thought of, like not knowing where to find rewards or feeling confused about the redeem system.
Findings
I found that this whole process was not easy. Sometimes I felt bored while doing it, especially during the long parts like documentation and research. But step by step, I also realized that every part is important to help make the app better and more user-friendly.
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