UXploration!

 Hello everyone! Welcome back to another week of UXploration! Today we'll be taking a look at the wild and wacky world of...used car sales, Oh, yes. Be afraid. Be very, very afraid. Buying a used car is a tricky endeavor to begin with. There are a thousand variables a person has to take into consideration. It's a large investment, and the consequences of that investment will be hanging around for a long time. As a businessperson selling used cars, you would probably want to communicate to your site's users that you're a trustworthy person, with a decent selection of reliable vehicles. You would want them to be able to browse your inventory, see your reasonable prices, and find your business location! The Good: Montebello Auto Montebello Auto does not have the flashiest site around, but it's clean, functional, and won't blind you with hideous patterns and colors that sear into your eyeballs (just wait). Montebello Auto's website is helpful and builds goodwill...

 Hey everyone! Welcome back to this week's UXploration! Up to this point, I've been alternating physical examples with web design examples, but I'm sticking with web design this week because I've got something very, very  special planned. Look, this week has been hard on everyone I know. We could all use a chance to decompress and relax, and I can think of no better way than with a massage. I know what you're thinking: Really, Shay? A massage?  In the middle of a pandemic? Okay not really , this is a UX blog for crying out loud, we're just looking at websites. Maybe some of the relaxation will drift through the screen and soothe our souls. The Good: In Step Massage In Step Massage is a small business near me. In happier times, I'd frequent their establishment because massages magically made my fibromyalgia subside enough that I was physically capable of working full shifts in winter (If you're reading this, ISM, I miss you so. much.). In Step Massage is ...

 Hi everyone, and welcome back to the latest UXploration! Yes, I know, the title is terrible, bear with me. If you're anything like me, you have at some point felt completely overwhelmed by the very idea of personal finance. If you've had a panic attack after opening a credit card, or searched the words "get my life together", these personal finance blogs might have already popped up on your radar. But whose user interface is more agreeable? Let's check them out! The Good: Broke Millennial Erin Lowry, queen of personal finance advice for my generation, has built an incredible and accessible brand guiding millennials (and others) through everything from essentials budgeting to investing. She even has a third book coming out in December about how to discuss finances with others (I promise, she's not paying me to say any of this). But it was her blog that started it all. #gyflt, girl Broke Millennial's UX is exquisite because it is simple, pleasant to look at...

Good evening, friends and fellow design fiends! This week, we'll be UXploring a common household item all of us have experience with: the remote control. Which of my clickers has a user-based design that reigns supreme? The Good: Roku In full disclosure, this is not the Roku remote that came with my device. It was purchased after I lost the first Roku remote, which was even more user-friendly. However, Roku does elegant simplicity very  well, and this replacement remote is no exception. The buttons have multiple functions, depending on the app one is using within Roku, but because there are so few buttons to begin with, this is not a source of excessive frustration. This remote is not perfect: do I really need one-click access to six apps? No. In fact, I only hold subscriptions to two of the featured apps. However, if I did need them, I would still find the remote easy to use, as each button is clearly labeled. Did I need a wrist strap for my remote? No, but it served as a great to...

Hey, dudes and dolls! We're back with new web design to critique, so take five and cool down while this hipster takes you on a trip to check out whose web designer had the chops for the job, and whose designer really laid down some clams. The Bad (As I'm sure you all remember, in jazz, "bad" means "good"!) This week, our prime example is the official website of saxophone luminary John Coltrane . Fact: Saxophones are the sexiest instruments. I won't go into this with a lot of detail today, but: I'm not a huge fan of websites that have a "landing page" like this. You know, where you first arrive at a display page and then have to click to truly "enter" a site. In this case, however, I can easily overlook it. The "landing" part is below the website's header. Even with the strong hierarchy the album name provides, the header is easy to spot. Coltrane's signature is also an icon that links back to Home. The navigation...

Hey again, everyone! Welcome to our fifth installment of UXploration! This week, I'm tackling something I love to talk about and design: packaging. Branding is such a fun topic to dig into, and I cannot wait I have a chance to delve entirely into that, but in the meantime, I'm going to just be talking about the user experiences involved in two collections I purchased that came in gift boxes. (Disclosure: I'm including links in case you want to see the items, but I do not have an affiliate link, so I make no money from this. Enjoy!) The Good: Frozen II Elsa Collection Set, by Colourpop My (Snow) Queen, everyone Show Yourself! While this blog is not the place for me to wax poetic about how much I love the Snow Queen and Elsa as characters and how much I adore makeup as a form of self-expression, I will say that this collection could have come in a recyclable brown paper bag, and I still would have shelled out the money for it. With that out of the way, this box adds incredib...