UX Study: Movie experience project
User Research
I started with learning about cinema websites and mobile apps. I wrote down my observations on few cinemas in Singapore (Golden Village, Cathay cineplex and Sistic, one of the ticketing system on performance events) One of the key things on majority cinema website: The content is overwhelming that made me cringe with too much distractions.
Interviews
I started off with interviews to figure out common movie-watching experiences and challenges. I split the questions into parts:
- behaviours
- before buying ticket
- payment process
- reach at cinema (movie day), and
- others
Key takeaways:
- With a movie in mind, user has a few locations then search for “acceptable” time range. (Spontaneous plan or after work plan)
- If the seats are not strategic (extreme front or side seats), users are most likely look for another location or timing combination.
- Most of the users have their own usual priorities(time, location and movie) in completing their movie purchase.
Interview details can be accessed here
Personas
Based on the interviews and surveys I sent out, it can be categorised into people who emphasised on the certain available free time, location that is convenient to them or preference in their movie choices.
Detailed personas can be accessed here
User Journey Map
With personas in mind, I mapped out their cinema experience journeys. Journey map gives a clearer insights of the woes and good traits based on the existing cinema experience in Singapore. I also stated the emotion that they feel during the process.
With needs stated down based on the overview of the pain points from personas, I proposed ideas that need to be further validate in prototype.
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Design
Objectives
The overall objectives of the design are to facilitate the movie experience by helping in movie decision making and ticket buying process smoother.
Pain point : Too much information so don’t bother
This app has only few colours as the contents are colourful and complex so design will not distract users away from contents. Same goes as grouping movies into different sections. For future, it will has a section called “For you” which uses user’s browsing history and movie bookings to recommend user movies.
Pain point: Too much unwanted options makes slower movie decision
Sometimes when users want to have spontaneous movie date and have to google “Cinemas around <location>” , thus putting in smaller map helps them visually know where are the nearest cinema around them. By typing the cinema that they wanted, the app will remember their usual cinema choices as well.
Others features
Movie reminder: Push notification to remind user and show user the direction to respective cinema from user’s current spot when it’s time for movie.
Bookings tab: Fast access to keep track of user movie history or upcoming bookings.
Conclusion
This UX case study has been a rewarding experience for me. Not only did I get to exercise my UX skills, I was also manage to learn new domain such as payments flows and cinemas buying systems. I do understand that open source APIs of cinemas(at least in Singapore) they are not open to public and considered limited in terms of integrations. This does not stop me in completing this case study to create a better movie going experience.
Hi do comments if you have any feedback and I would love to discuss with you.
