CASE STUDY

Helping service staff search better

BACKGROUND

Our Singapore Visitor Centre Lite app houses a diverse collection of different tourist destinations.

Recognising the need for an intuitive search experience, we decided to embark on creating intuitive categories that can benefit service staff.

MY ROLE

Lead Researcher

RESEARCH TYPE

Iterative UXR

RESEARCH METHOD

Card Sorting
User Interviews

METHODS

We wanted to look into the mental model of how our service staff categorises different tourist destinations. 

We conducted hybrid card-sorting — and created a diverse set of places — from popular ones to lesser known, contentious destinations that could be hard to categorise.

Staff are allowed to create categories of their own.

THE FINDINGS

There were clear and straightforward genres of places that the service staff collectively agree on — Food & Beverages, Nature, Nightlife etc to name a few.

However, there were apparent instances of genres where service staff could not agree on. They were Heritage, History, Arts and Culture. Different service staff have different interpretations of it.

i) Some service staff felt that 'Arts' meant anything that is pretty and nice.

Whereas others felt that 'Arts' should include cultural institutions, concert halls, theatres and galleries — places that encompass more than just pretty and nice-looking places.

Service staff also finds it hard to substantiate their rationale behind their way of grouping.

ii) Some service staff found it hard to differentiate what is 'Culture' and what is 'Heritage'. Some relate 'Heritage' closer to 'History' while others relate 'Heritage' closer to 'Culture'.

iii) There were also different interpretations of attractions that have been repurposed. For example, a historical post-war building have now been repurposed as an art gallery. Service staff, who were mostly tour guides in the past, tend to view its historical value, rather than what it is now.

CHALLENGES

There were no alignment and defined understanding of certain categories across all staff members.

As staff comes and goes, it is important to define these categories/genres and their grouping principles and meanings, to avoid subjective interpretations caused by differing understanding and knowledge.

CHALLENGES

Establishing definitions

Getting staff to define and agree genres/categorisations so that principles of these categorisation can be used on a broader range of destinations. 

Clear & concise groupings

Narrowing and grouping niche categorisations with similar ones to have a broader, much more generic categorisation that works.

Difference in knowledge

Differing knowledge and capabilities of different staff:  older service staff can have differences in the understanding of certain genres of places than the younger staff

OUTCOME

After rounds of hybrid card sorting, we further narrowed down the categories to the final 8. We grouped contentious categories together to reduce confusion.

There will be a learning curve for these final grouping, however, a consistent definition has been established — bringing about a more consistency experience across all staff.

IMPACT

Service staff was satisfied with the grouping and definitions and revealed the ease of locating attractions with the change.

This research exercise also provided definitions and clarity to mental concepts of certain destinations where it was initially vague and ambiguous.