enso
Project
Enso is an app designed to connect users with an aggregated collection of eyewear from the world’s best boutique brands. Enso would allow a user to find their preferred style, along with the customizations they need at the best possible price. Enso is available exclusively online to simplify the eyewear shopping experience for millennials
Year
2020
Type
Product Design
System
iOS, Web
Problem Space →
Millennials are experiencing higher rates of not having access to affordable and trustworthy designated places to buy sunglasses, prescription glasses and contact lenses
Objective →
To provide millennials with an effective and accessible way to purchase eyewear (frames/lenses) they need with the customizations needed at the best price.
How might we provide those in need of eyeglasses or contacts, the frames/contacts they want with the customizations they need at the best price?
DISCOVERY OF PROBLEM SPACE
Turning a personal struggle into a viable solution.
Key Research Insights
About 55% of Canadians wear eyeglasses as their primary means of vision correction today. First, there are simply more people needing vision correction due to health-related issues and second, and more importantly, an increased demand for stylish glasses.
However, despite being commonplace, glasses are notorious for having excessive costs; in 2019, Vox published an article highlighting the excessive markups of designer label glasses, with some markups going as high as 1000% (Vox 2019).
With an increase in demand, variety, and an excessively high cost of purchase users can feel overwhelmed when it comes to buying eyewear.
Market + Competitor Research
Luxottica Analysis Luxottica Group is an Italian eyewear conglomerate and the world's largest company in the eyewear industry. It is based in Milan, Italy. As a vertically integrated company, Luxottica designs, manufactures, distributes and retails its eyewear brands. Merger with Essilor; a French-based international ophthalmic optics company that designs, manufactures and markets lenses to correct or protect eyesight.
EssilorLuxottica newly formed and control major stakes in optical industry.
Company Portfolio
Including LensCrafters,Sunglass Hut, Apex by Sunglass Hut, Pearle Vision, Sears Optical, TargetOptical, EyeMed vision care plan, and Glasses.com. Its best-known brands areRay-Ban, Persol, and Oakley.
Interview Insights
Persona Development
User Journey
Ideation / Process
Phase #1
When you open the app, the logo appears on a white screen, followed by the home page once the app is fully loaded. There’s no indication whether or not the app is loading…
I realized going through this phase required some pivots as when user testing was conducted, users found some of the verbiage confusing.
Low fidelity version used to translate to high-fidelity.
Hypothesis Statement
I believe that If I create a more communal experience users wouldn’t feel isolated in a social environment will lead to a more successful and less frustrating experience creating for all no matter no matter the location. I will know if I’m right when design processes can be completed by designated teams to work through the design problems with low frustrations and good outcomes.
Phase #2
I decided to pursue the insight regarding personalization, because I felt like the high abandon rate for other e-commerce apps were high, as a lot of shopping focused applications lack a sense of personalization for the user.
If I wanted people to build long-term habits, I needed to build an app that supported a wide variety of uses and users.
I did, however, keep in mind that I could use the other insights to supplement and strengthen my idea surrounding personalization.
Final prototype version used to translate to high-fidelity.
Visual Identity
Keywords
- Minimal
- Calm
- Connected
- Longevity
- Approachable
- Detail-Oriented
- Trustworthy
- Thoughtful
*The meaning of enso is derived from theJapanese word that translates to ‘circle’. The design is meant to be anabstract interpretation of the human eye, which also illustrates the goldenratio proportions. As the design arrived at completion, it started to resemble a monocle, or even an iris.
Typography Exploration
Type/Brandmark
Colour Sequence | B&W
Colour Sequence | Brand Colours
High Fidelity
Grid System
Typography
Text Styles
Iconography
Primary Task
1) The primary task flow would be uploading a photo or entering in preferences for frame type - (like a Shazam for eyewear) that searches the web, and then presents results.
Secondary Task
2) The secondary flow would be to customize those lens/frames etc... and get the best price available web wide.
Prototype
After the wireframes, we build an interactive prototype to test the interaction and usability. In this prototype, it's already applied a style with colours and elements to make it as similar as possible to the end product for user-testing and feedback purposes. In this step, it's important to avoid starting the coding stage with usability problems that will be more expensive to fix later on. If we need to change something after the user-test we go to the previous stages and repeat the process.
Final high-fidelity.
Marketing Site
The website offers a product-centered experience that demystifies product personalization and customization.
A simple site architecture surfaces the most critical information.Friendly, plainspoken copy puts enso’s benefits front and centre and makes iteasy for users to understand how the platform drives revenue and loyalty.
The site experience motivates customers to offer enso’s corefeatures and makes them feel confident that their end consumers’ personalization will be a success.
Key Project Learnings
I began with a thorough analysis of the app and explored what interactions existed and where there was a room for further exploration. The first thing I noticed was that loading screen animation is quite anti-climactic. When you open the app, the logo appears on a white screen, followed by the home page once the app is fully loaded. There’s no indication whether or not the app is loading…
Next Steps
My next steps are to once again test! I plan to review my final prototype with target users to see if the design makes sense and if it truly fits their needs. This will help build a stronger case for my project and it is also great to get feedback from people who will actually be using the app if it were out in the market.
Impact & Learnings
This 10 week project forced me to learn and adhere to the design process: UX research methods, creating key artifacts, following iOS Human Interface Guidelines, and user testing.
If I were to redo this project, I would improve my questions for the user interviews. There is an opportunity for me to craft the dialogue during interviews to be more of a conversation and to dig deeper into some pain points, motivations, and behaviours.
Experiencing the whole design process, I am now able to understand the value of each step and how they can be leveraged and planned in order to manage my next project with different constraints.