Marriott

Executive Summary

Marriott’s business goals include increasing online sales through their digital properties, websites, and mobile app; enrolling new members in their loyalty program; upselling hotel rooms and flight packages; driving customers to their luxury and lifestyle properties, and reducing reservation abandonment. The UX research focus is to learn users' preferences, expectations, and pain points and a recommended an action plan that provides an immersive user experience for Marriott to achieve its business goals

Two UX research methods, interviews and user testing were used. Four participants were selected for the research. Virtual interviews and in-depth user testing of Marriott's digital properties was performed. Synthesized the results and presented the findings to the class

Key findings include:

• Participants search for hotels in various ways: Google search, travel booking sites like expedia.com, trip.com, booking.com, etc. They find it easier to book a hotel, flight, and rental car together

• They had low awareness of Marriott digital properties, loyalty program, luxury & life style properties, and hotel and flight packages

• Participants prefer a computer over a mobile device for their online reservations. The usability testing uncovered a few challenges: luxury lifestyle options are not highlighted, participants were not aware of hotel, and flight packages on the website, participants could not find the lowest price, etc.

Recommended action plan:

• Provide consistent user experience across their digital properties. For example, the mobile app highlights room + flight or room + car options, but the website does not

• Raise awareness of their digital properties through promotions targeting their customers and showcase them on digital properties as well

• Make the Why join? page more immersive by showcasing the value, elite-ness, and superior experience. The existing loyalty program value is unappealing

• Redo UX research to include more participants through a survey because this study is limited due to time and budget constraints

UX Research Plan

• Analyze business goals to identify key UX research questions, UX hypothesis, and target user population

• Conduct user interviews and usability testing of Marriott's digital properties

• Synthesize user feedback to identify key findings and provide a recommended action plan

UX Research Details

Analysis of business goals to identify key UX research questions:

• Increase hotel bookings by 10%

  • • What is the preferred method for hotel booking?

    • Do they prefer website over a mobile app for hotel booking

• Increase reservations for Luxury and Lifestyle hotel categories

  • • Are customers aware of the hotel categories that Marriott offers?

    • What are Marriott's customer demographics

• Gain 10,000 members for the Marriott Loyalty program after redesign

  • • What is the customer awareness of Marriott's loyalty program?

    • What value / benefits are customers looking for in a loyalty program?

• Decrease the abandonment rates on room reservations by 20%

  • • What prevents users from completing room reservations?

    • What are customer preferences in hotel selection. price, distance, quality, etc.?

• Increase 5% on customers choosing hotel and flight package

  • • What are customer preferences in selecting hotel and flight packages?

    • What is customer awareness of Marriott digital properties as the destination of choice for hotel and flight packages?

Hypothesis Assumptions:

Customers prefer (or challenged) :

• The website over the mobile app for hotel booking

• Travel sites over the hotel site for a hotel or hotel + flight bookings

• Value (low price) vs. Lifestyle (luxury, high quality, safety) vs. location in hotel selection

• Loyalty program expectations and their perceived value

• Challenges in completing the booking (search criteria, trust, process, time to complete the booking)

Targeted Users:

• Four participants with experience using Marriott Hotels were selected for interviews and usability tests

Video Interview Insights

• Customers prefer online travel agency sites like Expedia over Marriott due to the price comparisons

• Location and safety are important in booking the hotel

• Perks like free meals, free WiFi, free parking, free upgrades, bonus night stay, etc. conversions to the loyalty program

• Customers book their hotels at night because they perceive they get good deals

• Mostly use the computer to make hotel bookings, rather than a mobile device

Usability Testing Insights

• Unable to find the price sorting filter

• Difficulty finding currency exchange rate while searching for the room

• No autofill feature for loyalty member when booking the room

• Felt tedious to book and customize a room using the mobile app

• Unable to click on the date range on the calendar

• Difficult to use the "explore the destination" feature

• Inconsistent user experience between the web site and the mobile app

  • Room + flight and Room + car are highlighted visibly on the mobile app

  • Brands drop down list is available on the mobile app

  • Filters are more prominent on the desktop site

Lessons Learned

• Translating business goals into key UX research questions. My marketing degree helped me a lot here

• Formulating the right hypothesis is key for successful UX research

• Interviewing is a better method to collect customer insights and usability testing is better in capturing user pain points

• Learned about customer preferences in hotel booking, web sites they prefer

• Impressed Marriott has 30+ brands operating in 131 countries

• Marketing research and UX research go together when it comes to learning about the consumer behavior experience