Timeline: 4 weeks
Role: end-to-end UX/UI designer
Daffodil is an application for perfume lovers!
The users can learn more about the perfumes they love, connect between them, and buy or exchange perfumes second-hand.
The problem
Perfumery is an expensive and sometimes lonely sport.
Lots of perfume enthusiasts have to order online either samples of the perfumes they want to try, go to a store to try them out, or even blind-buy, risking not to like the perfume in the end.
The solution
With this application, they are able to join a community where they can discuss everything about the scents they are curious about, as well as buy second-hand much cheaper or even exchange with perfumes that they have in their collection and they don’t really enjoy.
Understand what is important for a perfume app to include
Understand what kind of information users are looking for when searching for a perfume
Identify the different personas
Investigate how to make the perfume purchase process easier and cheaper
Create a community for perfume enthusiasts
Goals
Target Group
Gender: Women/Men/Other
Age: 20-45
Competitor Analysis
These are the main competitors:
SWOT
Strengths
Leader in the fragrance world
The first place that everybody will check to find out important info about a fragrance
It has over 88.141 perfumes listed and 1.663.784 reviews
Weaknesses
The links it provides for purchasing a perfume are mainly for the US users
It doesn’t create a community of perfume lovers, it just provides the possibility to write a review on a fragrance
Opportunities
Since it is not really the place to purchase a perfume or make the user feel like they belong to a community, it leaves the space for a competitor to create something like that
Threats
It’s very difficult to beat this leader because it is the first online space that comes to the mind of the user when they want to discover a perfume
Strengths
It’s a perfume encyclopaedia, with descriptions of the fragrances, reviews, as well as interesting facts
It has very clean design and it’s easy to use
modern and appealing
Weaknesses
It’s not that well-known
Someone would need to search more online in order to find and download it
Opportunities
Users cannot purchase a perfume through the app
The app doesn’t create a community, the user just has the possibility to review a fragrance
Threats
It can be quite challenging to design something that is more modern without copying their design and just using it as inspiration
Strengths
Users can purchase a fragrance
They have a profile with perfumes they own, follow other profiles and have followers
It is mainly for a niche market and collaborates with niche brands
It is created by a very famous perfume influencer
Weaknesses
it is not widely used by people who prefer to use designer brands
It is not well-known to people who don’t follow the specific influencer or that they don’t support her
Opportunities
Since it is mainly for the niche market, it creates the opportunity to have something for people who are just now getting interested in perfume
Threats
It is difficult to compete the specific app when it comes to niche brands, since the influencer that has created it has close relationship with them and can provide discounts for the users
The research
Interviews
6 people from various nationalities, both female and male were interviewed.
Some interviews were held online and some in person.
I posted on social media that I would like to talk to people who love perfumes and would use a fragrance app and I interviewed the ones who reached out to me.
Insights
Lots of the interviewees are influenced by the perfume content they consume online, by influencers on various social platforms
Two categories were created:
the niche lovers who don’t mind spending a lot of money on perfume as long as long as the quality is there and the environmentalists or people who want to try many perfumes but don’t have the budget to buy newThey all loved the idea of perfume exchange or buying second hand - the niche lovers were just concerned about the authenticity
Everybody thought that the creation of a wishlist was very useful
The Interviewees
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Marta
She buys perfumes 2-3 times/year. She has a particular taste in perfumes, so she checks on Fragrantica perfumes that are similar to the ones she had already and really liked. In that case, she also feels safe to blind buy, otherwise she wouldn’t risk it.
She has never bought samples, she has always gone to the shop to try the perfume first. Also, she can be influenced by some lifestyle bloggers/vloggers that she appreciates and trusts. She really enjoys talking about perfumes and she would like it a lot to belong to a community.
She usually buys her perfumes in physical stores to be 100% sure that they are authentic.
She finds the perfume exchange idea very interesting and she would be up for trying it. She added that “instead of perfumes, it would be nice also to exchange samples of perfumes” that we each have.
She would love to be able to keep a wishlist - she has been wanting to have one for a while now but didn’t know where to store it.
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Celine
She buys perfumes every 4 months more or less. Currently, she is buying more expensive ones so she sticks to them until they finish.She checks a lot the reviews on Tik Tok and the notes on Fragrantica. She sometimes also goes to the physical store to smell them and makes a comparison.
She would like to belong to a fragrance community.
She usually buys her perfumes on Wallapop (a second-hand app) or on a discount site called “Perfumes 24 horas”. As she says: “I always try to find perfumes cheaper than on the selling price.”
She would love to be able to exchange one of her perfumes for something that is on the equivalent price. She also wouldn’t mind receiving a bottle that is half empty and used if she sees that the exchange deal makes sense.
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Jose-Antonio
He buys 1-2 perfumes/month. Before he buys one, he does quite an intense research by asking around other people and he is also checking information online (YouTube, TikTok, Fragrantica, blogs).
He has a deep knowledge of perfumes, has a big selection, and has a preference for niche brands. He would enjoy being part of a fragrance community because he doesn’t have any friends who are as into it as him. In the past, he was also a Fragrantica user.
He usually buys his perfumes from physical stores or straight from the company website, to make sure that they are authentic.
He finds the idea of a perfume exchange interesting because he says that everybody has a few “bad investments” in their collection, but that in that case, there should be a valid way to check the authenticity. For him, when he is willing to pay for or exchange a perfume, the value of which is more than 300 euros, then he needs to make sure that he is getting the real thing. As he said, “frauds are a collector's worst nightmare”.
He would love to be able to keep a wishlist since he has over 60 perfumes that he would like to try shortly!
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John
He buys 5-6 perfumes/year. Ideally, he would like to buy a lot more but he can’t afford it. Before he buys a perfume, he does some research, mostly testing various fragrances in physical stores, word of mouth, or searching online products with similar notes to perfumes he already likes. Things that are important to him are: Ingredients (he has lots of allergies), cruelty-free brands - he is vegan and this part is the most important to him, scent, and price-quantity.
He doesn’t care about the reviews posted about a fragrance because he believes that it’s a personal matter. What would catch his attention would be to smell a perfume on someone else or test it in a store and then search for the ingredients, if it’s cruelty-free, and the price.
He finds the idea of the wishlist very useful, mostly because he’d like to be able to check the list of his friends when he’s on the hunt for the perfect gift for them.
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Alice
She buys perfumes every couple of months. She is following lots of fragrance influencers on YouTube so if something gets her attention, the next step would be to check Fragrantica for the notes, the fragrance family, and the reviews. Also, she’s always very curious to try fragrances that are trending and everybody in the perfume community seems to be going crazy for.
She would love to be part of a community - she always wants to talk about perfumes but she has only one friend who is as interested as her and they can talk for hours!
She mostly purchases her perfumes second-hand, so either Vinted or Wallapop, for two reasons: it’s cheaper and better for the environment. She knows, however, that it can be risky to get a perfume that is not the original.
She loves the exchange idea, according to her it’s a win-win situation. Regarding the wishlist, she said “There are lots of perfumes that I’d like to try but I don’t know where to store that info. And then, when I finally go to a beauty shop, I don’t remember which ones I wanted to try and end up losing my time.”
Affinity Map
Personas
Antoine - the niche enthusiast
Antoine is 28 years old, he is working as a social media influencer and one of his hobbies is perfumery. He loves everything that has to do with perfume (designer and niche) and he buys 1-2 perfumes every month, after a lot of research.
He prefers niche fragrances, for their complexity, originality, and quality and he is willing to spend a lot in his search for the perfect perfume.
Frustrations:
He doesn’t have a lot of friends who share the same passion so he would like to be able to belong to a fragrance community
He wants to challenge himself to take his knowledge to a deeper level (learn about the different notes, fragrance families, creators, etc)
He doesn’t feel safe to buy a perfume at a discount store because he thinks he risks getting a fake one
He doesn’t have a store that sells niche perfumes close to him, so he is usually tempted to blind-buy, risking paying a lot for a perfume that he might not enjoy in the end
Goals:
Join a fragrance community to be able to share his passion with like-minded people
Challenge himself by learning more about fragrance (its history, the notes & ingredients, creators, more niche brands, etc)
Create a place where he can try or buy perfumes easier and cheaper, without feeling the risk of getting cheated with a fake perfume
Maira - the sustainable buyer
Maira is 32 years old and she is working in event management. She has always loved perfumes but in the last few years, she made a turn in her life.
She became vegan, started joining organizations for the protection of animal rights and against climate change and removed from her life any cosmetics that were experimenting on animals. In general, she is trying to be as careful as possible in her choices, while still being able to continue with her hobbies and passions.
Frustrations:
She has to do extensive research to find sustainable perfumes
Usually, sustainable perfumes are much more expensive and they can’t be found easily
When buying perfume on a second-hand app, she always risks that it won’t be authentic
Samples for sustainable perfumes are not easy to find, so usually she just needs to buy the full bottle and risk not liking it
Goals:
Be able to find a sustainable perfume with clean ingredients without spending too much time trying to double-check everything
Be able to exchange a perfume for another with another user of the app
Be able to buy just a sample from a user who has a perfume she is interested in
Save money from buying/exchanging second-hand through this app
Problem Statement
The users usually don’t have a lot of friends who share their passion for perfumery
People need a platform that allows
them to not only learn more about perfumes,
but also connect between them
Perfumes are often quite expensive to buy from the company’s website or beauty stores
Find an alternative way to give the possibility to buy perfumes cheaper and in a more sustainable way
The users are checking many different platforms to get information before they buy a perfume
Explore ways to create a platform where perfume enthusiasts can find all the info they need on a perfume
People who love perfumes have lots of different ones that they want to try but they forget which ones they were
Explore ways to create a reminder of the perfumes they’d like to try in the future
Site Map
The development
User Flows
Low-Fi Wireframes
Mid-Fi Wireframes
Mood Board
Style Tile
Logo Creation
The first idea & evolution
Then I took a slightly different direction
The final logo
High-Fi Wireframes
Usability Test
I asked 5 people to test my design and give me feedback.
Specifically, I asked them to test these two flows:
Complete the account creation, search for Burberry Brit, and contact Marios (one of the users) to buy it or exchange it with him
Search for Vanilla 28 from Kayali and add it to your wishlist
Feedback
Perfume description screen
It’s not very clear that the description of the perfume finishes and the reviews start. Find a way to separate the section of the reviews in the perfume screen, maybe with a background color.
Add a star rating of the perfume from the people reviewing it.
A tester suggested adding a button under the “Add to my wishlist” button that says “Buy it now”, which will take you directly to the Sellers screen and remove the sellers from this screen.
Another tester also said that she found it difficult to find the sellers on this screen.Remove the search field because you already found the perfume you wanted.
The title “Burberry Brit” looks like a button. Same for more screens.
One tester said that maybe it’s better to put the notes directly under the description of the perfume and after that the buttons of “Add to my collection” & “Add to my wishlist”.
Sellers screen
This screen is overwhelming. Some testers got confused and said that they couldn’t find easily what they were looking for.
Remove the search field because you already found what you were looking for.
Chat screen
It’s good to have the option to buy directly the product, without having to chat with the seller.
The back arrow and “Chat” look like they are connected so someone suggested putting the back arrow more on top, to not be aligned with the chat. Same for almost all screens.
Marios’s profile
It’s not clear it’s clickable the last section of Burberry Brit.
All pages
The logo is too big, make it a bit smaller.
Final Result based on the feedback
Complete the account creation, search for Burberry Brit, and contact Marios (one of the users) to buy it or exchange it with him
Search for Vanilla 28 from Kayali and add it to your wishlist
Key Takeaways
Sometimes when you are very excited about a project, it’s quite challenging to put your enthusiasm aside and focus on what the users need
Talking to people testing your design again and again is the key to save some time before creating the high-fidelity wireframes
It can be quite difficult to create something that covers the needs of many different categories of people and imagine how each one of them would use the application. However, putting people in categories through the personas helps a lot to identify their separate needs.
