QVC Internship
User Research | Accessibility | Usability Audit
QVC is a TV network and e-commerce platform owned by Qurate Retail Group. As a UX Researcher intern at QVC, I worked on two projects to support the discovery and evaluation of current and future designs for our products.
Shared below are a few highlights of the projects that I have worked on.
My role: UX Researcher Intern
Tools: Sketch, Figma , Adobe Illustrator
Team: 1 UX Researcher , 1 UX Designers
1 Senior UX Manager and 2 UX Research Interns.
( Collaborated with the development team)
Timeline: Jan 2020 - May 2020
Project 1 - Accessibility Improvements for QVC
Why is accessibility important?
As researchers, there is a lot that we don’t know about how people with disabilities manage their daily tasks. We need to be designing inclusive and accessible experiences for users of all abilities. QVC wanted to focus on making its digital platforms accessible to all users. I conducted user interviews with an Accessibility Panel consisting of participants who are blind, color blind, had low vision.
Problem
Understanding digital accessibility challenges is easy if you know people with disabilities. But what if you’ve never seen a person who is blind use their computer or smartphone? QVC Mobile applications were not very compatible with accessibility features . They had issues with screen readers and were not complying accessibility standards.
Research
I conduct ethnographic, qualitative, and behavioral research to understand how people with disabilities use e-commerce websites. I also conducted user interviews with blind users followed by a complete UX Accessibility Audit of the QVC Android and iOS mobile application. This research was then handed over to the UX design team for design changes. The accessibility audit was evaluated in collaboration with the development team to set development standards to make the application accessible to blind users.
Tools and software
For accessibility research: Apple’s iOS VoiceOver
Android TalkBack
Microsoft Narrator
JAWS
For User Interview: User Testing via Zoom
Deliverables
UX Audit Report
User Interview Synthesis report
USer Testing Key Findings report
Learnings and Takeaways
You can design your websites, software, and hardware with accessiblity in mind and you can retrofit existing technology to be accessible. It’s a win-win situation for your organization (more clients, more revenue, more contracts) and people with disabilities (less confusion, less frustration, less isolation). Some fixes, like auditing your content structure and alternative text, are quick to do and make a big impact on the user experience.
Audit and research was completed by reference to W3c Accessibility Guidelines
Project 2 - Improving the Search Feature for QVC.com(Mobile)
Mobile first experience
QVC's vision is to create a "video-first mobile experience." QVC was a "video-first" retailer right from its start in the mid-1980s in the form of a TV broadcast. Now, QVC is looking to achieve an early-mover status among multi-channel retailers in enabling a video shopping experience.
Problem
We received customer feedback about the ‘‘Search” feature designed for QVC.com for Mobile. It was not the most usable and intuitive and could be improved.
Research
We started with usability engineering for finding the usability problems in the search feature so that they can be attended to as part of an iterative design process. Heuristic Analysis helped us evaluate and explain each observed usability problem with reference to established usability principles, the UX Research report was then handed over to the UX Design team to create revised designs.
Research Method:
Heuristic Evaluation using Baymard Search Query Analysis.
Deliverables
Heuristic Evaluation Report
Learnings and Takeaways
Majority of users will perform on-site searches on mobile. If the search is effective the user journey shows improvement. ‘Search’ can be a valuable feature to evaluable insights through Analytical Research. A good ‘search’ feature will improve the SEO for your website thus benefiting the business and revenue.