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• Role: UX Designer
• Scope: Adding a mobile app feature to Square's POS product, specifically, the Checkout and and Transactions pages.
• Timeline: 80 hours
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Square is a financial services and digital payments company that provides point-of-sale hardware and software to business owners.
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Square’s mobile checkout app doesn't cater to business owners that sell unique or one-of-a-kind products. Many small business owners with unique inventory enjoy the simplicity of Square but don't have inventory management methods that the app supports.
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Square added a mobile app feature that allows business owners to take photos at checkout so they can track and record unique item sales transactions easily and efficiently.
I started this project because of a conversation with a local business owner in Georgetown, DC that sold antique home goods. We were discussing the challenges mom and pop shops were facing in the wake of COVID-19 and how she was troubleshooting a new POS system she could use on the go, Square. Many store owners in her business community used this product, but she wished it catered more to her business–one that sold unique products, had rotating inventory, and antique finds.
I took to the streets of Georgetown to have more conversations with small business owners about their sales operations, technology, and tools they used to run their business. This is how I realized that the first business owner I spoke to wasn't the only one encountering a problem when selling their unique and one-of-a-kind products.
I set up time to talk and learn more from these local businesses owners. My goals were to:
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During the interview process I discovered that almost all of the interview participants had some existing issues or frustration with their current POS or payment processing solution.
The main themes that emerged were:
Most users said they’d value a feature that would allow them to visually record items while checking out customers.
Since the POS product space is highly competitive and saturated, I wanted to see what other platforms were offering solutions to the types of business owners I was speaking to.
I focused on competitors that offered mobile software and hardware products like Square (physical terminals or card readers) or catered specifically to the kind of business owners whose problems I was looking to solve–the ones that sold unique, one-of-a-kind products and were small in size (between 1-3 people).
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I created user personas to exemplify the kinds of business owners that would benefit from using a quick photo feature in the mobile POS checkout experience.
Since the majority of business owners that I interviewed used the Square POS mobile app, I added the feature to the Checkout section (where sales are processed) and the Transactions section (where sales are logged).
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The current checkout experience allows business owners to add a note to a sale, but not a photo.
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I replaced the existing Note component with the new photo feature, and bumped the note's functionality to be a part of the quick photo process. With the new photo feature, you can take or upload a photo from your camera roll and label the photo.
In the current Transaction experience (where sales are logged), business owners can only see their Transactions in list form.
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I iterated and explored different design solutions for this part of the feature, mainly with toggles and switches. Ultimately I went with a solution that fit most closely within Square's design system.
With the new photo feature, business owners can scroll their Transactions like a photo library, and toggle between viewing Transactions in a List View or Grid View.
The prototype tested 3 tasks for users on the Square POS mobile app across 15 screens:
(1) Take a photo and label an item at checkout
(2) Upload a photo and label an item at checkout
(3) Find a Transaction in the transaction list grid, then send a customer a receipt
77.8% Avg. Task Success Rate
78% Avg. Usability Score
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The key learning I got from this project is the importance of practicing discipline to create simple solutions when designing within a design system. Designing a new feature within in a design system calls for a solution that functions in a new way, but visually looks similar to the rest of the components in the digital product.
