Working as a user experience designer for my team, I was able to help redesign a real estate market analysis product using Figma to give it a modern look and simplify the search process.

Purpose

The interface of the application had not been updated in over a decade, and it showed. However, the real estate agents, bankers, business analysts and other professionals that used it had gotten use to its design and the process of obtaining the information they needed. For this project my team needed to create an interface that was easy to understand and use to entice new customers, but at the same time not alienate the old ones.

Process

Survey

After talking with our sponsor company’s product manager, we had a good idea of what they were looking for with their product. However, we still wanted to understand the actual users of the product and determine the features they frequently used or desired. So a 15-question survey made on Qualtrics was created, and the company sent it to many of their users. We received nine responses, and from that we learned that most users were not particularly looking for any of the new features we proposed in the survey. But an important finding was that many users took the data received from the product and used their own software to visualize it. This meant there was a possible area for improvement within the application.

Personas and Storyboards

After obtaining some information about the users of this software, we were then able to create user personas and storyboards.

Sketches and Wireframes

The team used whiteboard and paper sketches to create our updated version of the search function as well as new features such as the settings page. To decide on the design we would use for higher-fidelity prototypes, each team member sketched their version of a solution to a particular problem, and the best ideas from each sketch were combined. Once a design was agreed upon, wireframes were created in Balsamiq.

High-Fidelity Prototype

Using the style guide the company provided to the team, we were able to create an initial set of designs for the screens in the product.

The sponsor company’s product manager liked the new design, but gave us a few suggestions so conform our design to industry standards, such as the overall color scheme and copy used. Additionally, the team looked at a variety of website prototypes online, to better understand how more experienced designers made a dashboard and settings page. Our final high-fidelity prototypes was much more toned-down in color, which ended up being perfect for the type of application being redesigned.

Conclusion

Features

• Modern design that provides an improved experience while utilizing the same core functionality to ensure that old and new users alike will not be confused.

• Search function can now be done on a single page, and a dedication section for filters was added.

• A settings page was made from scratch, and now users have a profile, with admin users being able to change geographic and subscription level.

• The original data visualization features in the product was very disorganized and unhelpful, so our team created an improved version that standardized the color scheme, and had clearly defined axis, titles, scales, and legends.

Lessons Learned

• From the beginning, communicating with our sponsor company was tricky, as they were always extremely busy with other projects. Had my team communicated what was needed early on, we probably would have been able to get access to a test environment of the program much sooner.

• It is very important to talk to actual users of the product early on, but since the only way to contact these users was via our sponsor, this proved to be a challenge

• What our sponsors wanted out of the redesign did not always match up with what existing users wanted added to the application. Our team needed to balance both of these needs to create a product that would satisfy all stakeholders.

• It is very difficult to have everyone on a team of six people helping out in their area of interest. Our team needed to decide how each team member could be the most effective, while also making sure they were happy with their role.