Creating Memories With Marriott Experiences.

The problem:

This project was designed with the specific goal of creating a user-friendly app for hotel guests, allowing them to easily find enjoyable activities and attractions to explore during their stay at a Marriott hotel.

Live app: activities.marriott.com

Year
2019

Client
Marriott

My Role and Collaborators

  • Cartoon illustration of a girl with long dark hair, smiling, with blush on her cheeks, wearing a shirt.

    Mali (Me!)

    DESIGNER

  • A cartoon illustration of a person with a surprised or worried expression, short black hair, and wearing a shirt with a pocket.

    Rob

    PRODUCT MANAGER

  • Cartoon illustration of a girl with long, dark hair, wearing a white shirt with a collar and buttons.

    Katheryn

    FRONTEND ENGINEER

  • Simple black and white cartoon of a bearded man wearing a beanie and a mask.

    Karl

    BACKEND ENGINEER

  • Illustration of a young person with short dark hair, smiling, wearing a white shirt with a black collar and buttons.

    Jaya

    DATA SCIENTIST

  • A cartoon illustration of a person with curly hair, smiling, wearing a collared shirt.

    Jamie

    STAKEHOLDER

As a lead product designer, I successfully led comprehensive UX research and produced engaging mobile and desktop prototypes that met user needs. I worked closely with various stakeholders throughout the design process and maintained a continuous feedback loop with the team to ensure alignment and improve the overall design outcomes.

How I came to my proposed solutions?

As the product designer, I embarked on a journey to create new mobile and desktop apps focused on a well-defined design process. The journey began with collaboration with cross-functional teams, including engineers, marketers, and user researchers. Together, they defined the core requirements for the app, such as its primary function and target audience.

The team generated numerous concepts through a series of ideation sessions, exploring various layouts, color schemes, and user flows. By iteratively refining these concepts and incorporating user feedback, the designer arrived at a solution that met the functional requirements and provided a seamless and intuitive user experience.

A timeline diagram illustrating the stages of a project, starting with kickoff and ending with MVP design, including activities like competitive analysis, user interviews, data visualization, wireframes, and user testing.

Success Metrics

The app achieved an impressive average of 42 bookings daily for each of the two hotels involved. This remarkable performance indicates strong demand and user engagement, which is based on the design process and decisions made along the way.

This chart shows the growth in experience bookings after the newly designed MVP .

User Flow

The user flow outlined the Happy Path of a Marriott guest as they booked an experience. This exercise helped identify areas of pain-points.

Data-Driven Design Decisions

In the process of designing, I carefully looked into various analytic data and trends to methodically test my assumptions along the way. This thorough approach helped ensure that my design choices were well-informed and effective.

A computer screen displaying a line graph with green lines indicating data changes over time. The screen shows app branding with the logo 'Pendo' in the bottom left corner.

Persona Development

Profile summary of Jenna Sanders, a 35-year-old female professional traveler, including her travel preferences, pain points, needs, and user traits.

For Marriott, I used analytics to spot demographic information about the users. We focused on professionals who are staying in a foreign city and looking for things to do in their free time. We also focused on families that book their vacations ahead of time and are on a fixed budget.

User Testing

A person's hand using a laptop with a travel experiences website displayed on the screen. The workspace has a stack of books, a glass of water, and plants in the background.

I conducted a detailed test of three distinct prototypes, meticulously examining a specific hypothesis regarding the functionality of navigation systems. Our primary goal was to ensure that all activities were easy to locate, even when the user was uncertain about what to search for.