Nicole Cook from ShopStyle recently approached us for a review of their iPhone app. Following previous user feedback they made enhancements to the app, so we thought this was a great opportunity to kick off some more regular reviews of mobile apps on our blog. Let us know if you’d like your app reviewed.
We’ve put this review together following usability testing with a mix of regular iPhone app users and novice iPhone app users, as well as an expert user experience audit.
What is ShopStyle?
ShopStyle is an application which pulls together a number of different retailers into one place, allowing users to search and browse products on one app rather than visiting different apps or websites. Users can refine their searches to see all the products from the retailers signed up to the service, saving time and effort visiting different stores. Once a product is found, users are taken to the retailer’s site to complete their purchase.
The Good
- Saves users time searching through different retail sites for products
- Good categorisation of products
- Users can quickly mark an item as a ‘favourite’ to build a list of items they can look at in more detail later while they browse
- Users can discover products from brands and websites they may not have heard of or would not have found on the web
- Very visual way to browse through products which supports users high street shopping behaviour of flicking through clothes racks
- Refine options show how many items match the search criteria
The Bad
- Loading times can be slow as the app downloads lots of images in one go
- Even when users have refined their search criteria, there can still be a lot of items to scroll through.
- Some of the prices in the app are not accurate when clicking through to the website
- Prices are excluding delivery so it’s difficult for users to get an accurate view of how much they are likely to spend, instead users have to visit the website and find delivery costs and returns policy information
- When scrolling through a number of items it is difficult for users to tell how many more items are left as there is no scroll bar
- Refining options can be a little clunky if users want to refine a number of different items at once
- Accessing product information is a little unclear
- Some product images include model shots and other don’t which can give users a slightly disjointed experience
Our Top 3 Usability Improvements
- Limit the number of images loaded at one time – Because the app is so image heavy, it can take a while to download all the images when users are on the move. Flickr deals with this by downloading 40 thumbnails and then users can ‘load 40 more’ which allows the application to load a smaller number of images quickly
- Give users more control over filtering and sorting by price – Most users are price conscious and therefore rely upon price filters when searching for suitable products. With ShopStyle, users are forced to select a predefined price category when refining by price. Users however, want to search between their own minimum and maximum criteria e.g. John is willing to spend between £45 and £60 on a pair of jeans but has to search through a selection of jeans priced from £25 to £100. In addition, users need the ability to sort the results returned. We feel that allowing users to sort by price would be very useful for users.
- Improve button placement – When users wanted to refine their searches by more than one criteria users tended to select the filter, then click ‘Done’, which took them back to the products listing. They would then realise they needed to go back to ‘Refine’ to add another criteria. We feel that this problem could be solved by improving button placement and labels. Bringing the two options closer together and labelling them ‘Refine more’ & ‘Done’.
Other Usability Improvements
- Add a scroll bar to searches
- Improve navigation options to make it clearer how to move left and right, and how to see product information
- Add a feature to allow users to compare details of the items listed in their ‘favourites’
- Allow users to save their personal preferences such as their shoe size, waist size etc. to provide personalised searches
- Add user ratings to searches and encourage users to add their own ratings to products
- Allow users to filter results by stores offering free delivery
Conclusion
Overall, we found the ShopStyle app offered users a good experience and users found the app to be extremely useful to them. The app does have some usability issues but none are showstoppers. Despite this, we feel that the improvements we recommend above will make significant enhancements to the overall experience and will become more important as more and more retailers sign up to ShopStyle. We look forward to seeing the improved version
Do you have an app you’d like us to review?
