Reimagine demo bookings at events
New function designed in an event mobile application service (real-client project - international event in 2019)
UX Techniques used for the project:
Hi-Fi Prototype
UX Research
User-Flow Design
Usability Testings
Project Brief
One of the international's event held in year 2019 was using the my previous employer’s event conference system solution to provide event mobile application services to its event participants. In this international event, the event organisers would like to create more value for its event participants, hence one of the request is to have a function that allows demonstration bookings to be done via the mobile application.
Understanding the “problem”
Why demonstration booking?
With the industry getting digitised, the traditional way of making bookings at a counter physically during the event is losing its popularity. Hence, a digital solution is needed for such a purpose.
Seeing such great potential the requested function had, monetary values and efforts were made to work on the digital solution for integration to the existing event conference system solution.
The infographic (on the left) is according to the industry trend that I had observed (in year 2019) with the following sources:
Requirements that event organisers had listed out for their event mobile application service vendors to comply
Actual data collected from the events that had engaged the event mobile application services
*please do contact me for an authorised usage of my infographic
Creating more value for the participants of an event is one of the goals of an event organiser. One key value an event can bring about is to have event participants see active engagements and connecting among themselves through the event. Hence, event organisers are partnering up with vendors to come up with digital solutions for such a need.
One of the ways to connect event exhibitors and delegates/visitors is through the organization of event exclusive product demonstrations as this meets
Event delegates/visitors’ needs: allows direct access for event delegates/visitors to interesting event exclusive product demonstrations, making the event more enticing to visit
Exhibitors’ goals: help channel potential qualified leads to exhibitors since there’s a better exposure opportunity available
Event organisers’ needs: having higher visit rates from event delegates/visitors and attracts more participating organisations to provide the event exclusive demonstration opportunity
How is the digital solution more beneficial for everyone?
Event Organisers
Lesser resources needed
Lesser organiser booth needed to be built
More ground area for exhibitor booths
Lesser manpower needed
Demonstrators
Real-time information dissipated; timely decisions can be made
Access to booking list whenever necessary; need not depend on event organiser
Demonstration Participants
No need for queues; time at event can be used more efficiently
No time & location restrictions; booking can be done anytime and anywhere
Considerations for designing the new function
Different event participant have different access rights
Usually in an event, there are a few types of event participants whereby each type can enjoy different benefits according to the event package they had paid for, as shown in the following graphics. So, the app has to correctly identify the right user in having the access to demonstration booking function, which thereby resulted in many scenarios to be considered when designing the flows.
2. Design of new function have to be according to the current development infrastructure
Due to the following reasons, the general design (UI screens and starting screens flow) of the demonstration booking feature should be of a similar style to the whole app, supported by the current development infrastructure that is in place.
The project timeline for the end-to-end production of this new feature (demonstration booking) was very tight
The UI design of the new feature should be consistent with the other features within the app (the UI style of the mobile app was not touched upon in this project)
Development process can be much more efficient as the same programming class can be used
UI screens design and flow for “Exhibitors feature”
UI screens design and flow for “Speakers feature”
User flows designed for the new function
The different scenarios to consider:
Participants booking a demonstration slot (do not have any existing booking)
Participants booking a demonstration slot (have an existing booking made)
Participants cancelling a booked demonstration slot
App users that do not have access book demonstration slots
Demonstrator is also a participant of another demonstrators’ demonstration
Non-demonstrators’ flow for demonstration slot booking
Demonstrators’ flow
Design details
Button for filtering out demonstrations that are fully booked
Giving users the convenience of looking at only timings that have slots for them to book to avoid confusion
Lesser scrolling is needed since the screen will be shorter in length when only timing with available slots are displayed
Icon changed after a demo slot was successfully booked by user
A booking icon was changed into a bin icon indicating that
the user had successfully booked a demo slot at that timing
the user can cancel the booked demo slot at the same screen
Real-time indication can notify users of their interaction with the system to avoid any confusion
Error message shown if any unsuccessful demo slot booking was made
Message was shown to notify user why their demo slot booking was unsuccessful
Real-time indication can notify users of their interaction with the system to avoid any confusion
Demonstrators’ screen is different from non-demonstrators’ screen
Demonstrators are able to see the participants that had booked their demo slots
Different icons were used for the participants’ attendance status i.e. Pending, No-Show, Present
Changes to design made after usability testings
Booking button was not shown for demo timings that are not accessible to the user
According to user feedback received during usability testings, users were aware that they will not be able to book a demo slot at certain timings as
There are no more available slots (understood from the 0/no. of slots that were available shown)
They do not have permission to book (understood from the error message shown)
However, they do prefer that the app could tell them that right at the start when they first visited the screen. As they felt that the initial screen design had given them false hope on being able to book the demo slots, only to feel disappointed when they tried to book it. Hence, for demo timings that were not available for booking to the user, no booking icon will be displayed.
