Readings Kids: An online book store that gives you the touchy feels

If you’ve ever walked down Lygon street in Carlton, I guarantee you’ve popped your head into a Readings bookstore. Maybe you were on your way to a dinner date and had to buy some time, or perhaps you were looking for something unique that you couldn’t find anywhere else.
There’s no question that Readings’ in-store boutique experience is just that. A unique and engaging experience. So why is it that their online store falls a little flat? They still sell the same products. They provide the same recommendations. Readings believe that if we can understand the customers’ buying journey in relation to children’s books better, then we can give their users a beautiful experience online. That’s where we come in.
Victoria Murphy Role: UX Designer
Student project at General Assembly
Market Analysis, Personas, Storyboarding, Card Sorting, Usability Testing, Low fidelity mockups.

Design and Research Tool Kit

Our mission and timeline

“ to create a new website for children’s books that reflected Readings’ values and offered the same boutique experience they offered in-store.”

The team worked together over a two week sprint. In the first week we focused on finding the problem, and in the second week we focused on solving the problem.

The Approach

Using the tools above as well as following our Project Plan and the double diamond, we followed the tasks below in order to discover & define the problem so we could develop and deliver the solution.

My role

In this project I was responsible for the Primary Research phase of the process. I conducted 8 (1hr) user interviews which were conducted over Zoom. I felt ownership of the Synthesis stage because I felt a real connection to the research. Having this insight into the users behaviours allowed me to champion the personas and problem statement.

The team and I conducted usability testing via Zoom which was a challenge as it was our first time online, but a great learning experience. I also contributed to the iconography on the prototype. Although we each lead certain tasks, there was still a strong emphasis on collaboration.

The Discover Phase

Empathising and Understanding

Readings know who purchases their books

Market Research: Direct & Indirect Comparative Analysis

Looking at our direct competitors

These stores are bookstores (like Readings) that have a children’s section. They’re the local bookstores, the ones that cater for children of all ages, the ones with storytime events and the ones with enthusiastic and knowledgeable staff offering great customer service. Their unique selling point is their curated collection, their focus on the community and access to local authors.

Comparative Research with Department Stores

Kmart, Target and Big W each offer competitive prices like Booktopia etc, yet have an in-store experience. Apart from the low prices, their big selling point is front facing book displays.

Opportunities found

In-store book purchases

Front facing display of books (Visual Merchandising)
The ability to feel the weight or texture of the book/inspect the book

Online book purchases

Wide range of books on offer
Convenience
Good way to find book recommendations

We created a Topic Map to find out from users:

1.

How the user is currently buying children's books
2.

What does a successful option look like to them? Are they happy with Readings kids stores or do they want online?
3.

What does a successful option look like to them? Are they happy with Readings kids stores or do they want online?
4.

Importance of cost to customer

The Define Phase

Synthesis of data

Affinity Mapping

Interview Findings:

Synthesising our affinity map, we found 3 main trends and key insights from our users to implement into website.

Wanted to check books themselves

Customers prefer to shop in store as they can check the content and materials of a book.

Nostalgic

Decisions could be influenced by nostalgia from childhood memories.

Categorisation

Customers also make decisions by age, author, genre or classics.

Value Proposition

Once we had our key insights from affinity mapping, we turned our insights into “I” statements to create an empathy map to help us define our personas.

Defining the User: Empathy Map

Synchronising our insights from our Affinity Map + Empathy Map into 2 Personas

Understanding the Problem

Customers need a way to more accurately and realistically assess the children’s books they are viewing online, so that they can feel confident in their online children’s book purchases.

The Develop Phase

How to solve the problem

Ideation

Crazy 8’s to generate ideas

With the user flows in mind
Brainstormed ways to link to existing site
Ways of displaying and previewing book
Different ways to show categories & checkout progress through icons

Hypothesis

“We believe that by providing clear and detailed information associated with children's book listings for our customers, we will be able to re-create elements of the in-store process involved when selecting a book, and provide the user with confidence in their purchase.”

Proving and Disproving the IA

Card Sorting- Remotely via Optimal sort

Based on our insights from card sorting we created a sitemap for the primary navigation, and focused our approach on creating the options for browsing by category and age group.