Scenario: Imagine that you are a web designer at a consulting firm. In this role, you will attempt to win a contract to perform a complete website redesign for a local spa. Your potential client's website was developed by a spa employee with rudimentary web development knowledge. This basic website caused a lot of confusion for customers and increased administrative work for office staff. Customers could not schedule services from the service page and were required to remember the service code to input into the scheduling page. In addition, no validation was implemented, which resulted in nonexistent or wrong services being scheduled and unnecessary staff being called in while the necessary ones were given the day off. The poor design of the site also prompted many users to abandon their task and either call for an appointment, which took a toll on the receptionist, or decide to go to another spa altogether.
Prompt: In order to "sell" the spa owner on your approach to website design, which includes user-centered design (UCD) and usability testing, your proposal should explain why UCD and usability testing are necessary to design a website that will meet the needs of the spa's customers. Additionally, your proposal should include the steps and techniques that you will use to gather information from users to help you design the new website. Remember that you do not have the job yet; be comprehensive and clear in your proposal so that your potential client will be motivated to award you the contract for the job. It should provide the spa owner with the following:
• A comprehensive description of user-centered design
• An explanation of why user-centered design is the right approach for designing the spa website
• A description of the user-centered design best practices that you will apply to the design of the new spa website
Guidelines for Submission: Apply appropriate organization and document formatting that is specific to your audience (the spa owner). Remember, this is how you can emulate a unique, professional proposal to further differentiate your proposal from others the client may receive. Some examples of formatting elements that you might elect to use include the following:
• A professionally designed cover page
• Graphics such as images or diagrams that enhance content points
• Document orientation (portrait versus landscape)
• Page layout (multiple or offset columns)
• Appropriate fonts and text styles for section heads and body copy
• Use of color to enhance content points
Page requirement: 3 pages - APA Double Space