Established in 2002, HulaHoliday has been providing Kauai vacation rental units for almost 20 years. Like most technologies that span decades, this site was in need of an update.
I was brought in as the sole UX/UI Designer for the project.
June 2021 to Sept. 2021
The Problem
The owners had noticed a downward trend in traffic to the site spanning several years. Competition from larger sites like VRBO and Airbnb with modern interfaces were pushing the Hula Holiday presence to the far reaches of the web.
After evaluating a large collection of email correspondences and request forms submitted to HulaHoliday by customers and potential customers, over the past several years, the data pulled from those correspondences helped to define a key problem.
The data revealed that customers were having difficulty navigating the site, and were often unable to find the information they were seeking.
With a review of the HulaHoliday site, I understood the frustration felt by the customers in those emails and forms. Hard to find navigation "buttons," large amounts of disparate information packed closely together on the same pages, along with an intense, and sometimes muddy, color scheme made it difficult to navigate through the site to the desired goal of viewing and then renting a vacation condo.
Although holidays provide a much-needed break from the stresses of our everyday lives, the planning of those holidays can often be just as stressful and frustrating. Where to go, where to stay, booking flights and cars - it can all make us want to pull our hair out. By re-evaluating the design of the Hula Holiday site, we could - at least - remove the stress and frustration from the process of booking a vacation condo.
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The Solution
A complete redesign of the Hula Holiday site was decided upon. The core updates needed to involve laying out the website so that information was much easier to find. The design also needed to make it easier for would-be vacationers to know how to navigate the site.
The Process
Keeping in mind the customer personas created from the forms and emails, I began to sketch out a user flow for the revamped Hula Holiday website. During the construction of this flow, the user's easy journey from entering the site to booking a vacation condo was always at the forefront.
Once I felt confident that the user flow would meet the needs of the Hula Holiday customers, I began to layout the elements of the website in rough sketches. I then translated the rough sketches into digital wireframes, and then into a low fidelity prototype of the website.
The prototype was given to volunteer users to test their ease of navigation through the site toward their desired goal. The insights gained from these prototype tests led to a few iterations of revisions.
The Finished Product
The redesigned website now includes large navigation buttons that are easy to find. Information has been separated and categorized. And large blocks of texts have been replaced by smaller information packets that are easier to consume.
The Old Website Design
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Small, camouflaged navigation buttons that were hard to locate
Long, scrolling pages holding large blocks of text, making it difficult to find the desired information
Disparate information on the page that didn't belong in the same category as each other, making it unclear where to find what information
The New Website Design
Large navigation buttons housed within a shape to help them stand out
Large blocks of text have been revised and broken into smaller packets of information removing clutter and confusion
Each category of information now has it's own page allowing for the user to more easily find the information they are seeking
The color theme for the site was also redesigned to reflect the amazing sunsets and peaceful natural beauty of Kauai to add to the user's excitement & joy
View the Full Prototype:
Hi-Res. DESKTOP Prototype
Example of a User Flow on the Redesigned Website
Users can now easily find information on the rental condos, and make a reservation
Re-Branding
Along with a redesign of the website, I was also commissioned to update the Hula Holiday brand and logo, to allow for a look and feel that more closely related the ease and beauty of Kauai (where Hula Holiday's condos are located).
The Outcome
After the redesign of the website, the owner of HulaHoliday reported a significant uptick in traffic to the site.
Prototype interviews & post-launch interviews revealed users found the redesigned site much easier to understand and navigate.