Goodreads Redesign Project
What is Goodreads?
Goodreads is a website that connects users with trust reviews and recommendations on what to read, rather than sourcing information from unreliable reviews or corporate-run bestseller and reading lists. The mission of Goodreads is to help people find and share books they love.
Project overview
What it's about
The project focused on redesigning Goodreads website, in order to provide up-to-dated information about books and premium services to the current user group.
My role and tools used
I worked with other three classmates. As the only member experienced with UX design in the team, I create most of the prototypes, including sketchings, wireframes, and the final deliverable. Tools we used include Figma, and HTML/CSS.
Timeline
It is coursework for my web design class. It took about 2 months to complete.
Why Goodreads needs a redesign?
I am a big fan of books, and I have used Goodreads to track my reading progress for years. Sometimes, I feel that their website is kind of out-dated and their content is unorganized. Recently, I found people around me, icluding myself, started to try out other apps that had similar functions, and reduced the amount of time spent on Goodreads.
Goodreads is a very mature product, but also very set on features and services. During the past years, they didn't update the system very often, and it just doesn't meet user needs in some ways.
Goodreads also has several competitors which I’ll talk down more towards the end. If Goodreads wants to stay on top, I believe they will soon have to create a better designed site or risk slowly fading away as users continue to get frustrated.
User pain points
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The login page contains too much irrelevant information, it is overwhelming for users to receive big chunks of information on the first page they look at.
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Different features are cluttered on the page and it is difficult to navigate through the current information architecture of the website
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The current system is designed for readers, but Goodreads also offers services to authors, which is separate from the reader system. The interaction among users is very limited. The intend is to improve the social interaction on the platform among users, including reader-reader, and reader-author.
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The redesign project focus on engaging current members, encouraging participation in the social and review functions, growing their community through new memberships, generating revenue through ads and affiliate codes, and providing a space for authors and publishers to interact with readers and promote their material
Business goals
At the beginning of the project, we reviewed the current system. Goodreads is focused on engaging current members, encouraging participation in the social and review functions, generating new members and growing their community, generating revenue through ads and commission from the online bookseller links used by readers, and providing a space for authors and publishers to interact with readers and promote their material. Of these goals, the we have identified the top three as:
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Grow the community through the acquisition of new members
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Increase revenue from third-party book sellers
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Provide an accessible portal for authors/publishers to promote their work
Solution brief
The main strategy of the website is to encourage readers and writers to create an account to access the main features including, book recommendations, reviews, reading lists and the user community.
The secondary strategy of the website is to encourage users to buy books, whether or not they are an existing member. Users should be able to buy books directly on the website by clicking a buy button. Goodreads receives a commission based on affiliate links when a book is bought via their website. To increase profitability the website must promote the third-party purchase function to users with or without an account
The third strategy is to encourage authors to promote their books. Currently an author can create an account, list their books and communicate with users. However, an author may encounter problems finding this program as its existence is not effectively communicated on the home page, and author content is not readily available for other users unless actively sought.
How did we find the direction?
We did interviews with a few previous or current Goodreads users and learnt more about their experience with Goodreads as well as their struggles. Our interview process provided us with a wealth of insights, some of which were entirely unexpected.
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Users found the features Quotes, Quizzes, Trivia, Creative Writing, Ask the Author, and Giveaways to be unnecessary, and rarely used them, if ever.
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While the Groups feature and social media aspect of Goodreads held a lot of value, users found it very difficult to make friends or find groups on the platform
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However, when users had friends and were in groups, they found the social interaction aspect of Goodreads to be a huge draw to the app
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A former user specifically mentioned that not having a goal in mind for using Goodreads contributed to them no longer using the product
Getting to know the users
At the beginning of the project, we reviewed the current system and its target user. We identify three types of users, who see and use Goodread for different purposes.
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Casual readers
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Avid readers
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Publishers/authors
After carefully study the current users, we created three personas, one for each user type. The results are listed on the right.
Amy Liu
Casual reader
Leanne McKay
Avid reader
Brian Stone
Author
Creating user scenarios and user flow walkthrough
Casual Readers
Uses | Tasks |
|---|---|
Purchasing books through affiliate links | Add a book to the cart for purchase |
Looking for recommendations | Locate the reviews/recommendation portion of a book's page |
Browsing through books | Find the top 10 list for their favorite genre |
Avid Readers
Uses | Tasks |
|---|---|
Participate or create group discussions or reading clubs | Reply to a group chat message |
Providing detailed ratings reviews and recommendations | Add reviews to completed books |
Find highly personalize recommendations for their next read | Locate and obtain a book to read |
Publishers/Authors
Uses | Tasks |
|---|---|
Interact with readers and answer their questions | Locate new messages in inbox |
monitor reviews of their books | Locate book and view reviews |
Promote work to reading community | Create an account with the Goodreads Author's program |
Information architecture and sitemaps
Currently Goodreads includes a number of relevant pages and categories; however, the organization of these elements is not conducive to engagement. Having personalized book selections more easily viewable will encourage users to view and purchase more items. Reorganizing the hierarchical structure of the existing website content will make it easier for users to interact with and find the offered features, making usage more intuitive.
In addition to the reorganization of site pages, we are also adding extra content pages, derived from information already available on the website, into the hierarchy to help authors promote their works to readers, allowing them to keep up engagement.
Currently Goodreads includes a number of relevant pages and categories; however, the organization of these elements is not conducive to engagement. Having personalized book selections more easily viewable will encourage users to view and purchase more items. Reorganizing the hierarchical structure of the existing website content will make it easier for users to interact with and find the offered features, making usage more intuitive.
Inspiration for the reorganization and formatting came from other popular cataloguing and social media sites, namely Facebook and Pinterest, as well as book selling sites such as Indigo. Using common elements from other popular sites will make usage more intuitive for users, whether new or existing. We borrowed common elements, such as icons and content placement and hierarchy organization, to improve the intuitiveness of the site
Currently Goodreads includes a number of relevant pages and categories; however, the organization of these elements is not conducive to engagement. Having personalized book selections more easily viewable will encourage users to view and purchase more items. Reorganizing the hierarchical structure of the existing website content will make it easier for users to interact with and find the offered features, making usage more intuitive.
Wireframes
Before getting into hi-fi prototypes, we did some sketches and wireframes to generate what we wanted it to look like. The sample wireframe on the right side shows that what changes we wished to make to the homepage.
After interviews and the user research, we decided to regroup the hompage content, and added a few more new sections to make it look more appealing and fun to check out.
The new design provides more information for users to browse, in case they are looking for reading inspirations. It is also friendly for avid readers, who know exactly what they want. Besides, Goodreads has a new section to promote books and authors from their picks.
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