el Locale
el Locale is a start-up e-commerce site that brings local shops and services to you at just the touch of a button. It allows local New Hampshire shops to connect with consumers anywhere. You can shop locally without ever leaving your house or city. With aspirations of branching out to other cities to bring many local finds to everyone around the nation.
Project Overview
el Locale is a start-up e-commerce site that brings local shops and services to you at just the touch of a button. It allows local New Hampshire shops to connect with consumers anywhere. You can shop locally without ever leaving your house or city. With aspirations of branching out to other cities to bring many local finds to everyone around the nation.
Timeline: 4 weeks
Team:
Joy: CEO
Jason: CEO & Developer
Me: Lead UX/UI Designer
Dina: UX/UI Designer
My Role
As el Locale prepares for its approaching June 13th, 2026 launch date, the company needed to identify usability issues for both shoppers and businesses and evaluate the informational architecture before releasing the platform. They brought in Dina and me to be a part of the el Locale team, as UX/UI designers, to help accomplish the following goals and objectives.
Goals/objectives:
Identify usability issues for both the customer and the merchant
Improve discoverability
Improve the organization of businesses
Reduce launch risk
My Role
I was brought on to the el Locale team to help the company meet those goals in preparation for the upcoming launch.
My Responsibilities:
Led website audits
Evaluated information architecture & navigation
Conducted user research on business categories
Auditing the Marketplace Experience
As the upcoming launch date was two weeks away, we prioritized website audits first to identify any issues that could negatively impact customers' experience. To evaluate the customer experience, I reviewed the primary purchase flow across desktop and mobile devices. I prioritized screens that represented the highest-risk conversion path, from homepage to checkout, to identify usability issues that could negatively impact purchasing behavior.
I reviewed key screens across several viewports, ensuring the site stayed consistent with branding, style, and user expectations. Several high-priority usability issues were identified, affecting navigation, purchasing, and mobile expectations. Findings were documented and presented to stakeholders, Joy and Josh, the CEOs.
Marketplace audit summary:
Audit reports Submitted: 3
Pages: View Shop, Home page, Product Page, add to cart, checkout, header, and footer.
Viewports: Desktop, Mobile (Phone), and Tablet
Major Finding 1: On the homepage, the featured product collections do not scroll on featured products on the desktop while using a mouse.
Note: Scroll behavior works fine on touch screen and trackpad
Impact: Users are unable to navigate through featured products.
Recommendation: Adding arrow buttons on both sides of the scrollable featured collections to improve accessibility.
Major Finding 2: On the product page, the “Buy Now” button takes the user to an empty cart upon selection.
Impact: Causes friction at a critical decision moment for users.
Recommendation: Map the “Buy Now” button to lead users immediately to checkout for the single item.
Major Finding 3: Mobile does not have a traditional footer but does have both a side menu and a bottom nav bar. Both share some features.
Note: Bottom navigation bar is only visible after the user scrolls to the bottom of the page.
Impact: The absence of a footer can cause confusion with user expectations.
Recommendation: Introduce a traditional mobile footer option. Use a sticky bottom navigation bar for future application launches.
Marketplace Website Impact
After completing the website audit, Dina and I presented our findings to the founders, Joy and Josh. The issues we identified were considered critical enough that they decided to postpone the website launch until July 2nd, 2026, allowing the team time to address the highest-priority usability and functionality issues before release.
Auditing the Merchant Experience
For the second phase of the audit, I evaluated the merchants' flow. Starting from enrollment, business profile setup, dashboard workflows, and item creation.
I reviewed Shopify’s business dashboard and item creation process to better understand industry standards before auditing el Locale’s experience. I decided the best method for this audit would be to create a mock-up business to experience the route flow as a new merchant would. This gave me greater insight as to what the users' needs would be. As I went through setting up a business dashboard, I focused my evaluation on visibility, clarity, consistency, and ways to build trust and reassurance with the merchant.
Finding 1: This box is reminiscent of a “checkbox” but does not behave as one.
Impact: Does not align with user expectations, as a checkbox indicates a task.
Recommendation: Change the “square” to the informational “i” icon.
Finding 2: Text on the Sunday times stating “Start” and “End” is cut off.
Impact: User confusion
Recommendation: Show the full text so the user can see the “Start” and “End” text on the Sunday times.
Finding 3: The Edit business profile icon can easily be mistaken for an “edit name” icon.
Impact: Business owners will be unsure how to edit the crucial profile edits due to confusion.
Recommendation: Changing the icon to a profile with a pencil icon. This indicates it is an edit for the business profile, not just the name.
Finding 4: Dashboard supports multiple locations, but the item creation process does not allow for assigning items to specific locations.
Impact: May lead to inventory and fulfillment issues.
Recommendation: Add multiple locations and inventory for each available location.
Finding 5: Item creation process lacks fields for entering item cost and a “compare at” (sale) price.
Impact: Prevents margin tracking and limits promotional flexibility.
Recommendation: Add “item cost” to enable profit margin visibility and a “compare at” (sale) price to allow item sale promotions.
Finding 6: Item creation process does not support multiple images for an item.
Impact: Users are unable to view different angles and features of items.
Recommendation: Allowing multiple images per item helps with the user's decision-making process.
Merchant Dashboard Audit Impact
I communicated the audit findings to the CEOs and developer through a report. I followed up with a one-on-one collaboration with the developer to clarify some of the issues encountered and provide detailed recommendations for icons.
We were able to quickly address some of the minor UI issues, as well as the issues regarding the dashboard supporting products being sold through multiple locations. The remainder of the issues were discussed and planned out to be a part of future deployments. As the new launch date was approaching, the CEOs chose to move forward with business onboarding to not further halt deployment.
Merchant audit summary:
Audit Reports Submitted: 2
Pages: Business signup, Onboarding screen, Profile Setup, Merchant Dashboard, Location setup, and Item creation
Viewports: Desktop
Evaluating Informational Architecture
Before deployment, it was important to ensure discoverability. Because many shoppers visit el Locale looking for specific local businesses, ensuring accurate categorization was essential to product discoverability.
My co-designer, Dina, and I quickly began reviewing the category lists these local businesses were to be assigned to. As the launch date was quickly approaching, we chose to prioritize the businesses' schedules to begin onboarding with el Local and cross-referenced them with the category list. There appeared to be an overlap with some businesses across several category options.
To best address this issue, I proposed running a card sorting exercise to find the shopping category that the 72 onboarding businesses best fit into. Upon approval, I developed surveys of each business that included:
Company name
Image of website and/or products sold
4 possible category options
1 “other” text fill selection, to allow for alternative responses
Dina and I conducted the surveys with 15 people with a similar demographic to el Locale’s users:
Age range: 20-45
Primarily female
Frequent online shoppers
Card Sorting Analysis
The results of the card sorting did favor the original category listing. Endorsing that the recommended category list does fit the vast majority of the onboarding businesses.
Summary:
87% of participants favored the original storefront category list
13% of participants reported that a business did not fit any recommended category list.
I then compiled a report detailing the categories, list names, and how they performed, along with recommendations based on their performance. This analysis showed us which categories were often found to be too broad or vague. Two categories specifically stood out: “Gifts” and “Home & Living” appeared to be too broad and may benefit from further definition. Recommendations like converting “Gifts” into “Gift Shops” and “Home & Living” to “Home Decor” or “Home Furniture” were suggested. This analysis showed us which categories were often found to be too broad or vague.