UX Case Study: I Have problem with Tiktok features and here’s how I improve them
Project name : I Have problem with Tiktok features and here’s how I improve them
Role : UX Designer, UX Researcher
Product Overview : What is TikTok? TikTok is a short-form, video-sharing app that allows users to create and share 15-second videos, on any topic.
Tools : Figma, Zoom, G-Meets
Hypothesis Problem
I’m actually the loyal user of Tiktok apps, not gonna lie this app is very entertaining. What makes Tiktok unique is their feeds timeline, FYP or as known as For You Page. FYP Is basically like explore page, it shows up a random video but its still adjusting to our interest, that’s how the algorithm works.
Iam using tiktok for 1 years long and I found a couple trouble of their feature, here’s what I found.
- I often pressed the home button and refresh button accidentally, I don’t even finish the video and its refreshed to another video which makes me stress.
- When you accidentally scroll the video and you wanna go back to that video, you must start the video from the beginning again.
- In Tiktok there’s duet and stitch feature. When some videos are meant to be dueted or stitched I’m always difficult to find the duet and the stitch video.
- If there are 4 parts videos, I always have trouble to find the rest part of the video. Especially if the rest part of the video is far below and sinking towards the most recent posts of the creator.
- Sometimes the caption, comments, likes, share button, profile etc. bother me because it covering the videos description.
- My Saved videos on Favorites are so many. I always struggling to find the specific videos on my favorites, when I need to review one of the videos, because it not well organized.
Design Process
I use the Design Thinking Frameworks in this case study. For me this is the easiest methods for this research.
Empathise
User Research
Iam directly conducting a quantitative research to a 12 Tiktok apps user to validate my Hypothesis. I use google form to make a questioner and here’s what I found.
- 60% of the respondent feel the same way with the Home button and Refresh problem.
- 60% of the respondent says that they also often scroll the video accidently, it makes them to start the video from the beginning again.
- 70% of the respondent tell that they struggling to find the duet and stitch videos.
- Half of the respondent says that they difficult to find a specific videos on Favorites page, when they want to review the videos that they save some time ago. The rest is not feel the same way because the saved videos on their favorites is just a few, so they not struggling to find the specific videos.
- 70% respondent says that the caption, profile, likes, comment and share buttons bothering their experience to watch the videos.
- 70% respondent says that they need a playlist for the videos that had a lot of parts.
That quantitative research more or less answers my Hypothesis. So I had to do an in-depth interview with 5 chosen users who fulfill the criteria to know what they really feel. I want to empathize further with their story.
Indepth Interview
After conducting a deep interview with five user with open ended question but still relevan with the problem. Finally I know what are their Behavior, opinion and experience. Here’s what I found.
- Often pressed a Home Button acidentically.
- Upset when he acidentically scrolls the videos.
- Struggle to find/tracking a duet, stitch and part videos.
- Considere caption bother the videos visual.
- Wish that there are foldering videos in favorites pages.
Quotes :
“If I accidentically scroll the videos, I have to start the video from the beginning again, it’s waste my time”
“I have to visit the profile to find the rest part of the video”
“Sometimes I couldn’t see the video description, because the caption blocking the video”
“it is hard to find the spesific videos on my favorites video”
“I have a difficulty when i want to find a duet and stitch videos”
Comparative Research
There’s two apps that I considere to compare with Tiktok its Instagram and Youtube.
Why? Because Instagram and Youtube is a little bit similar with Tiktok. Especially Youtube which only devoted for uploading videos. Different with Instagram that had feature to upload a photo. Anyway here’s what I found :
Instagram had a folder feature in saved Videos page.
Youtube had a playlist feature, so we could organize the videos that have many parts.
Youtube had a rewind and forward feature that able us to move forward 10 seconds or back 10 seconds, but in only appear in Youtube Mobile Apps.
Youtube had a slider for the timeline of the videos
Define the Problem
After knowing what are the problems from the Survey, Interview and Comparative research. Finally I gathered all the information and create the Affinity Maps to clustering the problem.
Problem Statement
Based on affinity maps we can conclude that
1. Home Button is often pressed by user
2. User often acidentically scrolls the videos
3. Duet and stitch videos are hard to find
4. The rest part of the Videos are often hard to find
5. The Favorites pages is confusing the user
User Persona
Ideate
After I define the 5 main problem which is Home Button Feature, Timeline Slider Feature, Duet and Stitch Feature, Part Videos, Favorites page. Here I’m just gonna straight to the point of the solution.
Problems>Solution
- Home button and refresh often pressed acidentically Adding the reminder box, “are you sure want to refresh”,
- User often acidentically scrolls the video > Add the slider for time line video.
- Duet and stitch videos are hard to find > Add feature that enable us to see the duet and stitched videos
- Part videos are hard to find > Add The playlist feature
- Favorites page is unorganized > Add the folder feature that enable us to clustering some videos
- Caption, comments, like, share etc. Borther the videos > make these features Hide-able.
Took these ideas and organised them in a feature prioritisation matrix. Here the results:
User Flow
Below are stated some user flow that users must take to complete their goals.
Prototype
Wireframe
I make the wireframe in Figma. The wireframe was made so i could imagine the flow first.
High Fidelity
High Fidelity design style follows the curent TikTok Apps Interface style. I’m not changing anything, Iam just adding some features and button.
For Stitch, Duet and Playlist Feature I combine them into one. So it well integrated and Easy to find it.
In the 4th Task, user have to slide to the right the screen, so the caption, comments, likes, share etc could be hidden.
In the 5th Task, user just have to slide the slider to the right and feel how intuitive the design is.
Test
To validate the design that I made, I then conducted usability testing with five users to know which part that I have to improve to be better.
Here’s the task that user should done :
1. You Accidenticaly press the Home Button and you don’t want to refresh it
2. You search for stitch, duet and playlist in video
3. You open your favorites videos to find a videos about places
4. You scrolls the video and you want to skip or rewind the videos anytime you want
5. You borthered by the caption, I want you to hide the caption that borther you
you can try my prototype too, click here
Based on the feedback from users on the fidelity prototype, I was successful in the following points:
- The User feel more safe with the reminder box for refresh button
- The Stitch, Duet and Playlist videos is easier to find
- Foldering feature in favorite pages make it easier for the user to find the videos that they search
- The Slider Feature making user able to skip or rewind the videos
- hideable caption make user more comfortable watching the videos
Feedback
“This is even more easy for me to find the stitch videos”
“I like the folder feature, it look organized”
“I could not see the slider feature for the first time i use”
“it took me a while to find the slider”
“Took me a while to find out that hide caption is slide to the right”
“I think you should write the instruction first, so i know what’s new with the apps”
From the user feedbacks theres few thing i want to highlighted
- Some user didn’t know slider feature exist
- It took user a while to understand how to hide the caption
But, the solution for that problem is easy. we just have to put the instruction first. The instruction is for showing the user that there’s an update in TikTok Apps. so the user will notice the new update.
Conclusion and Reflection
This is my very first time to do a UX Case Study Research, even tho I learn about UI/UX Design first. I learn a lot from the process of this case study. Even Though, Iam pretty sure that my research is solving some problem with TikTok Apps.
I learn that there’s no perfect Product Design. Because we now live in a dynamic era of digital. The needs of the user is often change and adapt to the circumstances and trends. beside the lack of my research, I am actually very happy to do this. I will never stop learning about Product Design Development. I hope my research portfolio will get better in my next research.
Cheers ya’ll
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