About

Challenge:
An ageing UI and outdated navigation were hurting usability — and any redesign had to work for both detail-focused weather enthusiasts and casual “lifestyle” users in a hyper-competitive market.

Client:
Weatherzone

My Role:
Lead Product Designer

Key Outcomes

We challenged an in-house assumption with data from 6,000+ users

Being new to the weather industry, I ran a full discovery to understand the business, the industry, and the users — producing a report to validate findings with the business before moving forward.

Business, product, and industry analysis

• Site heuristics test
• In-person discussions with stakeholders (marketing, meteorologists, management)
• Competitor site review
• Brand review—translating brand keywords into product features
• Product review—a first-ever “Product Map” of how users use which products, on which devices, at different times

User Research

• Review of previous user feedback
• Analytics and heat maps
• Survey of 6,000+ users (from a 3 million unique monthly user base) covering usability, design, layout, content, and department-specific data
• Refined existing user profiles

An idea wall turned competitor research into team discussion

Using the competitor review from discovery, I created an “Idea Wall” of UX elements worth discussing — a reference point for stakeholders and a live source of ideas throughout the project.

Alongside this, I ran a session with the Head of Product to regroup UX elements and review the site’s IA.

Two rounds of testing shaped the wireframes before visual design started

Scripting

I scripted tests combining qualitative and quantitative methods—fixed tasks across all ten users, plus user-specific tasks and contextual inquiry during free-use sessions./p>

Testing rounds

First round recruited users across our main ROI profiles, focused on:

• First impressions
• User-specific scenarios
• Site navigation
• Competitor comparison

After iterating on results, I worked with a third-party tester for unbiased testing, observing via video to take my own notes.

Findings report

Included usability problems, persona-specific differences, and a summary with recommendations.
Wireframing

Based on this research, I developed wireframes exploring different redesign approaches, regularly reviewing with the Head of Product to evolve concepts quickly. Once finalised, these became working prototypes for testing.

Visual design was tested again before handing to development

Visual design

• Home page and key pages redesign
• Reusable site-wide element designs

Third-party testing, round two

I again worked with a third-party tester for unbiased testing on the visual designs, observing via video to take my own notes. This produced a second findings report — usability problems, persona-specific differences, and a summary with recommendations.

Development support

• Guides for integrating reusable content across 50+ pages
• Style and usability guides
• UX support during development