Eurostar ‘booking magnet’ redesign:
Streamlined booking and destination exploration in one place
Position
I was asked to evaluate and understand the booking magnet with the aim of identifying and exploring areas for improvement
Problems
Users found global navigation complex
Visually, the UI was described as looking ‘dated’
Considering this was a travel page, the language and UI lacked excitement
Even though the booking magnet was the primary element on this page, it felt tertiary
Old homepage
Full page evaluation
I looked closely at the entire page from a user-centred perspective, identifying UX shortfalls that inhibited the overall goals and tasks at hand. From a visual perspective, I felt the page had certain artefacts that inhibited a smooth user-experience and listed them below:
Hero image detracts from primary function of page
Hero image and title could be mistaken for search result or a specific location-only search function
Lots of primary/secondary links
Search boxes look outdated
Booking magnet evaluation
The hero component fight’s for a user's attention too much, detracting from the booking engine itself
Visual styling lacks consistency
Supporting content feels forced and at odds with Hero advert e.g. travel classes and bag restrictions. These last two points might be better placed in the booking results page or, if absolutely necessary, it could be labelled as supporting ‘travel information’
Heuristic evaluation of
‘old booking magnet’ component
Heuristic evaluation of ‘old homepage’
Hero
Hierarchy of page has been re-balanced with focus being on booking magnet
Booking component
Colours, icons, improved font use, makes comprehension easier
Destinations
This section now looks like a compliment to the booking component above and does not fight for attention
Things to do
Three commonly looked for things to do when abroad are now cleaner and work better from a hierarchical perspective
Service info
This is tertiary information and has been styled accordingly
Booking engine ‘re-design’ evaluation
New homepage
This is the new design, with its tangible sense of travel excitement, improved input fields, imagery, colour palette, hierarchy and simplified global navigation—it was very well received.
Improvements:
Primary ‘search’ interaction is more prominent
Simplified nav reduces cognitive load allows focus on content
Video of destination in background creates ‘destination’ excitement
First-scan cognitive load is minimised
Breathing space introduced to aid comprehension and hierarchy
Language tweaked to aid taxonomy and comprehension
Feedback states on input states made clearer and looks modern
New desktop ‘booking magnet’ component
New homepage, Desktop + Mobile
This is the new design, with its tangible sense of travel excitement, improved input fields, imagery, colour palette, hierarchy and simplified global navigation—it was very well received.