Efficiently Handling Real Estate Transactions
Florida Realtors is a trade association with more than 155,000 members. The association launched Form Simplicity in 2011, a web-based application that helps realtors and brokers complete complex real estate transactions.
While the application performed its basic functions adequately, there were a number of usability issues that created a variety of problems for its users and staff.
The Challenge
Form Simplicity enabled a variety of customizations and state-specific functionality that supported the needs of its many types of members. Additionally, the Association recognized that realtors and brokers spend a significant amount of their time in the field, rather than sitting at their desk. Because of this, not only was it crucial to improve the usability of the existing system, but it was necessary to create a mobile-optimized responsive application.
Goals
Overall, the key goal was to streamline the user experience and create a system that was much more intuitive across all desktop and mobile devices. The underlying back-end of the application was quite robust, and we aimed to improve the look & feel of the application to bring it up to par with the quality of the back-end. We expected to see a reduction in customer service costs and improved user satisfaction.
The Process & Sucess
We began by examining similar applications and speaking with stakeholders throughout Florida Realtors to gain an understanding of their expectations and goals. We spoke with help desk analysts, marketing coordinators, high-ranking members of the technology services team, programmers, and others. Through their feedback, we were able to refine the goals of the project and uncover technical complications and limitations that were not immediately apparent.
Following the stakeholder interviews, we spoke to existing Form Simplicity users. These one-on-one sessions allowed us to better understand the pitfalls of the current system, which features were utilized most frequently, and see how realtors were completing these transactions within the application and outside of the application.
In addition to completing several remote interviews, the Iteration Group team traveled to San Diego for the National Association of Realtors conference in 2015 in order to get face-to-face time with current and prospective Form Simplicity users. At the conference, we were able to speak with users at length and also conduct hands-on user testing sessions on the existing system.
We received resounding approval and praise for the updates to Form Simplicity by its members, most noting that it was a significant improvement over the current system. We were able to come up with a significantly improved navigation structure for the application. We also used language that was more used-centered and relevant to realtors.
