Really Social
Hospitality social media marketing agency
‘Really Social’ specialise in hospitality AND social media, an agency AND an app – making it easy for restaurants and hotels to stay fully booked.
The problem
I was commissioned by an agency called ‘Custom Studio’ to review and improve the UX of one of their client’s apps called ‘Really Social’, and at a later date we collaborated together on the UI . The app had basic functionality but needed to expand in order to become a robust restaurant management tool, rather than just a means to post and track social media marketing.
The challenge
There is a desire for the app to shift to be more of a one-stop shop for restaurants to manage and grow their business and include features such as analytics and reporting, table bookings, ability to post across multiple accounts, social boosting and email creation. How do we enhance the UX to include these added features?
Current App review and Audit
A full review of the current app was undertaken, and it was clear that the dashboard was a good place to display analytical reports and social statistics giving a high-level overview of the user’s business. This could also include the company profile and messages. The existing ‘Content’ section would become ‘Campaigns’. Other prominent features needed were ‘Bookings’ and ‘Customers’ to review retention and acquisition rates with a dedicated ‘Social’ section to respond to multi-platform comments and messages all in one place.
User flow and added features
Introduction of welcome screens were added to give transparency on the purpose of the app which then led into the dashboard overviewing the business briefly with published marketing content revealing details of social engagement. Enhanced booking functionality was introduced which included creating, approving, or declining online requests – acting as a well-rounded management tool pulling data into one place.
Create a campaign
Scheduling targeted campaigns had to be simplified in just a few clicks with the opportunity to push content across multiple social accounts with options to boost the campaign to a wider audience backed with user engagement statistics.
UI Design
I collaborated closely with an agency called Custom Studio in the UI design phase as they created the new brand to help embrace the vision of becoming the go-to hospitality marketing specialist. A bold icon was created to build a strong brand presence, acting as a container to display photography with elements of repeated patterns to bring the Really Social brand to life. The design of the app reflected this with a striking colour palette and a unique blend of typography to pull out key data points.
Final thoughts
Both Custom Studio and the end client Really Social were extremely happy with the UX process and the final design deliverables. A range of complex challenges were reviewed and simplified with feature rich capabilities that were implemented in answer to the requirements of the user’s business goals.
We worked with Richard to initially establish UX designs for a new app, for one of our clients, which then led to the UI designs.
Richard’s expertise at the UX stage was vital as we navigated a complex user journey and feature set and then ensuring a new brand was brought to life in a visually engaging way, which was delivered expertly.
Highly recommend Richard for any UX/UI projects.
