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Volkswagen's Build and Price feature
A heuristic evaluation report for volkswagen's digital product vw.ca build and price feature.
00
REPORT OVERVIEW
Goal
Purpose
Insights
The overall purpose of the evaluation is to find existing website issues in the Volkswagen's Build and Price feature to improve the target audience's overall product performance to create a ritcher bottom line.
To conduct a formal heuristic evaluation of Volkswagen Canada’s digital product vw.ca for their online tool that allows users to build and price by applying Neilsen 10 Usability Heuristics.
There were many positive findings in the build and price feature, however, the overall realization was that the feature is still in dire need of re-evaluation and repair since there were an overwhelming amount of negative findings found.
01
INTRODUCTION
About
Volkswagen's Build and price feature allows the user to customize and personalize a vehicle based on their requirements and being able to see an overview of the approximate cost before making the final purchase.
We focused majorly on the negative findings within the feature during the evaluation process to help us understand the severity of the issue.
Task
One single long task served the purpose of accomplishing the goal set out by the UX team. Below is the actual task prescribed to each expert user guided through the Nielsen Usability Heuristics List:
"Use the vw.ca website to try and build your own customized Volkswagen and identify potential issues with the user experience."
Severity Ranking and Ease to Fix Key
SEVERITY KEY
Important usability issue
Difficulty in filtering the state-wise data of cases.​
S1
Medium Importance
Difficulty in filtering the state-wise data of cases.​
S2
Low Importance
Difficulty in filtering the state-wise data of cases.​
S3
EASE TO FIX KEY
Maximum Effort
Fix will require maximum effort, including more investigation into the proper solution.​
E1
Medium Importance
Fix will require concentrated effort, but the issue and solutions are understood.​
E2
Low Effort
Fix is easy to implement.​
E3
02
FINDINGS
02
Visibility of system status
Issue - Is the user notified about changes in their user journey?
When the user is going through Step 1 - Step 6, they are prompted to select their preffered choices at every step. While adding features to the build the payment option only updates the total cost of the build not providing information about the features added.
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Recommendation - A simple fix is to allow users keep track of what features has been added to their build is to keep updating the information and price of the features in the payment option. An example of it can be viewed in the highlighted and labeled image.
Key
S2
E2
Match between system and the real world
Issue - Is the user able to relate to the words and phrases used in the website? Is the information arranged in a logical order?
The information provided for the trim details is way too technical for a normal person to understand. The words and phrases used are not familiar to the user. The arrangement of information is also very cluttery making to difficult for the user to process.
​
Recommendation - Can present the information in a more arranged and logical order to make it easier for the user to process. An example of it can be viewed in the highlighted and labeled image.
Key
S2
E2
User control and freedom
Issue - Is the user able to undo or redo their actions?
Step-1 and Step-2 tabs aren’t clickable. Only after you have entered information in step-1 can you move to step-2 putting a constraint on the user’s movement. If the user wants to go back to step-1 and rectify, change or update some information entered earlier, there’s no option to move back. You can either close the dialogue box and carry out the process again or complete the booking with the wrong information.
​
Recommendation - Both the steps should be clickable and the user should be able to switch between steps whenever they want to ease the editing of information and redo to the same state after rectifying or checking information. An example of it can be viewed in the highlighted image.
Key
S2
E3
Consistency and standards (Internal)
Issue - Is the website maintaining internal consistency to help user carry out actions easily?
The buttons on the website doesn’t follow an internal consistency. The active and inactive state of the buttons are different on the same page.
​
Recommendation - A simple fix is to use the same UI elements for the buttons to help keep user focused on the main task instead of having buttons that are contrasting and would take away users focus from the task at hand. An example of it can be viewed in the highlighted image.
Key
S3
E3
Consistency and standards (External)
Issue - Is the website following external consistency to make it easier for the user to recognize actions?
The logo placement on the website is at an unsual position breaking the normal placement of logo’s on the websites. It might confuse the user in identifying if the button will take them to the home page or not. If there are a series of steps to be taken to complete a particular task, ideally there should be a previous button as well.
​
Recommendation - A simple fix for both the issues can be viewed in the highlighted and labeled images.
Key
S2
E2
Error Prevention
Issue - Is the system taking measures to help user prevent from error?
After the build process is complete the website prompts the user to select a dealer based on their region selection to help them move further in the process of car customization. The system doesn’t prevent the user from selecting a dealer that is currently closed making all the effort of building the car go to waste.
​
Recommendation - The system could inform the user by providing an error message stating ‘Currently closed at the moment’, please select another. So the user can choose from the options available to move further in the process without any frustration. An example of it can be viewed in the highlighted image.
Key
S1
E3
Help users recognize, diagnoze and recover from errors
Issue - Is the system helping the user to recognize, diagnose and recover from errors?
When the user clicks on ‘Apply for credit,’ a blank pop-up screen opens up with no content or information stating the error to the user. The system doesn’t help the user recognize or diagnose the error. Although there is a close option to help the user recover from the error it might actually increase the frustration for the user because they might think there’s some information on that page that they aren’t able to access. The labeled images show the user’s journey and problem area.
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Recommendation - To help user recognize and diagnose the error by showing some graphic element or text. Also, can very well update the information suppossed to appear in the area.
S2
Key
E3
The following are the negative findings based on Nielson 10 Usability Heuristic. We will be highlighting the problem areas and the possible recommendations to improve the usability of the feature by also providing a severity ranking and ease to fix key.
03
FEATURE ADDITION
Problem Statement
The main problem the user might feel while going through with the process is the loss of information if they leave the customization of the car in the middle or if some other issues are encountered while customizing the car. The user would have to go through the entire process again, also they will be forced to remember the features they added before.
What can we do to help tackle this issue?
Customizing a car is a lengthy process not to mention the amount of research required to complete a task like this. It is important that Volkswagen identifies and empathize with the user regarding this problem by creating a ‘User Account’ section that can be easily created by logging in with users google or facebook account which can serve multiple purpose for the user.
It can have information about previous VW models bought by the user.
1
Automatic saving of the information while going through the customization process so that the information is intact and can be revisited anytime to resume the process of building the car.
2
Unable the user to compare the prices and features of the saved build models of car.
3
Can have information about the lease and finance going on for a recently bought model.
4
It will enhace the user experience for the build and price feature on Volkswagen and also create an online presence that cares for it’s customers and does everything to keep their information intact for them.
Thank you!
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