Nancy Navish

Author: pqrbp

  • Daily UX Shenanigans: Nuya’s Essence

    Daily UX Shenanigans: Nuya’s Essence

    I am a sucker for organic beauty products. Until they made the decision to close their store in Dar and open a stockist and an online store, I had long enjoyed shopping at Nuya’s Essence. I haven’t used their web store yet, but I will without a doubt do so in the future.

    Photo by Kelsey Curtis on Unsplash 

    As a result, I went to one of the stockists to get my normal 2- to 3-month supply of body scrubs, cleansers, facial oils, and body lotion (if you haven’t tried it, please do). For me to purchase the products I needed on this particular day, I set out to the stockist store. Since I was already familiar with the store, I looked for any obvious changes that might indicate where Nuya’s shelf is. To my half surprise, I was unable to spot them, but that was my fault because they had been tucked behind a shelf that was directly in front of the entrance. 

    I initially pointed to the shelf when I asked the counter clerk where I could find Nuya’s products. When I arrived, there were only a few items there, mostly soaps and facial oils. When I asked one of the store employees if that was all they had, he directed me to the opposite side of the shelf. I discovered a few more items and chose what I needed. I inquired as to if there were any other items on hand because it wasn’t everything I needed. I specifically wanted the newly launched body butter cream, but the lady at the counter had no idea what I was talking about and told me that what I found on the shelf was all that was available.

    Photo by Aurélia Dubois on Unsplash  

    I’ve been a supporter and customer of Nuya’s Essence for the past five years, and I have no plans to stop. As a result, I feel qualified to provide my honest opinion on how the most recent modifications have affected my customer experience.

    1. I loved going to their shop; it turned into therapy for me and, on occasion, it made me feel like a little kid in a candy store. I find it disappointing that the store has been closed. 
    1. When I shop for nearly anything, having a person who is knowledgeable about the products and cares about them is an enormous advantage. I didn’t converse much with the shop employees at Nuya’s, but it was simple and quick to get my questions answered. Even better, they would suggest products for me to try, which made me happy.

    Photo by Viktor Forgacs on Unsplash 

    3. It was easy to get information about stock; if a product was running low or was going to run out, I could quickly learn about it and make plans to return for what I wanted once it hit the shelves.

    4. Not having a noticeable shelf/stand made the introvert in me want to cry because I had to talk to strangers (joking). The branding on the labels doesn’t stand distinctly among the sea of products from the stockist shop. Having Nuya’s branded display would be wonderful. It makes it easier to know where to get your Nuya’s goodies.

    Photo by SUN STUDIO CREATIVE on Unsplash 

    5. Some of the products had prices that were higher than those charged at the original Nuya’s store. For instance, island coconut oil is 30% more expensive than it is in Nuya’s store, and body lotion is 20% more expensive. The chaga in me is still processing this, it makes it more difficult for me to buy in bulk.

    Anyway, as I already stated, I won’t quit using Nuya’s products. I’ll do it while grumbling since girl child (me) needs a candy store. When I stop grumbling I’ll come and write an update. 

    Missing Photo credits: Unsplash

  • 5 ways to design and improve user experience (UX) for enterprise and complex applications

    5 ways to design and improve user experience (UX) for enterprise and complex applications

    Enterprise applications are applications that provide a coordinated way for organizations to share and work on information in order to achieve organizational goals and initiatives. There are different kinds of enterprise applications ranging from complex domain focused applications that focus on business processes management and automation, to resource planning and management, supply chain management, customer relationship management, and more.

    In this article I share the lessons I have learnt while designing enterprise and domain related applications.  

    1. Define user roles and their information needs. This is the part where if I hear someone say personas I might scream. I am not saying that personas are a bad thing, no, but when it comes to enterprise software, stick to user roles or you can use archetypes as explained by the Nieman Nielson group. When you focus on user roles, you are able to address the information needs and the pain points of each targeted user as well as be able to address the business goals that need to be met with the application.

    User roles also allow you to focus on roles such as application admins, people responsible for maintaining the application. They install, configure, load data, upgrade and report on any technical issues concerning the application. Designing interfaces for this user role is important because it becomes easier to onboard application admins when there are supportive interfaces for them to do their job, it also ensures that fewer people get to have direct access to the database because all the configuration can be done on the UI. In some cases, especially in small companies the application administrator is the same as the system administrator, but they can be different people.

    2. Create a solid information architecture, it will make navigation design easier. While doing your research work with all the stakeholders to ensure that you are aware of all the information that will go through the application. Based on the user roles and business requirements you will be able to know what information is expected by the user, how to display it and where to display it. 

    Being aware of the information needs, helps to create an information hierarchy that you can use to design user flows. Userflows assist with navigation design by giving a  snapshot of how the user will experience an application, complete their tasks and how some of the business goals are going to be met.

    Good navigation promotes usability and increases product credibility and acceptance. It also enhances a user’s understanding of the product, like. discovering and using new features.

    3. Get user feedback and iterate. Practice agile design as much as possible. Iterating and testing your designs with users allows you to account for changes in user behavior, technology and business goals. It will also help you to account for the mobility of users. Example, in a world of remote and field work people need to work on the go and testing and iterating will help you to capture their needs well.

    I worked on a project to build a web application that manages and monitors the implementation of infrastructure projects by combining data from different sources. During the first iteration we focused on the desktop version, but after the first presentation we learnt that users had to capture exact geo locations for map visualizations, and we were able to prioritize this in the next iteration which focused on mobile design

    4. Prepare yourself to design data visualizations and dashboards. Given the amount of data that goes through these applications, the right data visualizations can help different users interact and understand data faster. Dashboards provide insights that the business can use for decision making or further research.

    Familiarize yourself with data analysis so that as you are designing an enterprise application you are able to include different kinds of visualizations, such as trends, comparisons, correlations, spatial data or proportions between different sets of data. And depending on the application you are designing it could be a single dashboard or multiple dashboards.

    5. Aim for simplicity and minimalism. It might be hard to keep things to a minimum due to complex business processes but grab every opportunity to do so. It will help to reduce visual overload and users can find important things quickly. You can also create UI patterns that can be adopted in different features. For example in one project that I worked on we made sure that the base layout for most of the features is the same. The familiar structure allowed users to develop a mental model that helped them to quickly identify actions and learn new features faster.

    As I continue to grow in the field of UX design I am learning more things with respect to different kinds of digital products. I have learnt that whether building a product internally for your own company or building it for other companies to use,  it is important to invest in UX design. Integrating UX principles during product development ensures that products are built to provide efficiency and improve overall productivity. It also improves usability and creates user satisfaction which can directly impact product credibility and acceptance.

    Photo credits: Unsplash
    This article has also been published on LinkedIn.