Maha Care: E-Commerce Website Design

redefining a
natural hair oil brand

ROLE
UX UI Designer
Logo Designer
TOOLS
Figma
Adobe Illustrator

THE CHALLENGE

Maha Care is a Canadian small business dedicated to natural hair and beard oils. The business owner asked us to design a new Shopify website before the launch of their Instagram marketing campaign. The current site had a high bounce rate so the client wanted any usability issues addressed in time for the influx of new users. In addition to revamping the website, we were also asked to create a new brand logo for the site release. We were given two weeks to do both.
The increase in sales conversion rates, through the website redesign and the new logo, would grow the business and start building brand awareness within the local hair and beard oil community.

DIVING INTO RESEARCH

Before we conducted user interviews and competitor analysis, we started discussions with the owner to discover the current state of the business and its website activity. The findings are here.
Main Business Problem
The website had a high bounce rate and minimal time spent on the website.
Current Target Audience
  • Men aged between 15-25 years old
  • Students or early career professionals
  • Interested in social media, pop culture, etc.
  • Frequently online for long periods
Current Marketing Source
  • Offline : Word of mouth, Reaching out to barber shops and giving samples, hoping for wholesale adoption
  • Online : Instagram Marketing, Collaborating with other businesses and influencers
DIVING INTO RESEARCH
USER INTERVIEWS
To understand users’ consuming habits and purchase decision factors for beard and hair oil products, we chose user interviews as one of our research methods. We talked to five people who were interested in self-care products. They consisted of university students, grad school students, and early career men and women.
Usual Consuming Habits of Users :
Product discovery channels were friends' recommendation, Google, Social Media Ads mainly from Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. One of our key findings was that the participants invest a major part of their time researching the product looking specifically for trustful reviews or testimonials. All five interviewees preferred cruelty-free, natural, vegan, organic, and sustainable products.
Hair and Beard oil Consuming Habits :
Four out of five interviewees bought hair and beard oil products through online shopping, based on their usage. But offline shopping was also significant, namely because of ease of access and the ability to ask the employees about the products. It was important to participants that the product was organic and safe to use.
"... a lot of my lifestyle is natural. So it only makes sense that I will go in that direction for my regime."
- 22 yrs old college student who is detail-oriented, down to earth, empathetic, and passionate
"... because I'm putting it on my face and body, so probably want to do something that's organic."
- 26 yrs old software engineer who is laid back, tech saavy, optimistic, and a quick learner
DIVING INTO RESEARCH
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS
In addition, I conducted thorough competitive analysis to find the perfect niche that Maha Care could occupy in the hair and beard oil domain.
The competitors were divided into two groups.
They adopted a professional, premium, luxurious, and bold look and feel. They chose to focus specifically on men's grooming products.
They looked to portray a friendly, organic look and feel as a natural, customizable hair and skin care product company.
TIME TO OVERHAUL
At first, the brand the client preferred was one with an elegant, luxurious, and bold look. However, after conducting the research above, we discovered that Maha Care needed new brand qualities to shine and stand out amongst the competitors.
Since Maha Care sells both beard and hair oils, its brand should aim to appeal to demographics looking for either one. I recommended Maha Care to pursue the following values.
Transparency and approachability. The focus should be on natural ingredients as well as exude an air of elegance through the Maha Care products themselves
: a premium grade organic product at a reasonable cost
These values would meet the wants and needs of an additional target audience:
  • Men and Women
  • Aged between 15-40 ranging from budget-conscious students to new moms who worry about postpartum hair loss or hazardous ingredients for their babies
  • Frequently Online
  • Interested in social media, their well-being, self-care, and the environment

TOwards THE SOLUTIONS

Based on our discoveries, we buckled down on the design starting from the information architecture to the high-fidelity wireframes.
TOwards THE SOLUTIONS
SITEMAP
TOwards THE SOLUTIONS
LO-FI WIREFRAMES
Since Maha Care's website is implemented through the Shopify platform, we focused on designing the product pages, the ingredients catalog, and the testimonials page to help promote trust in the brand.
towards THE SOLUTIONS
LOGO DESIGN
The original brand colors and logo gave the company a look of bold, luxury, premium, and loyal products which made it less approachable to customers and did nothing to advertise itself as an organic beard/hair oil brand.
However, as mentioned above, Maha Care needed to promote its natural ingredients while making sure that its customers were aware of the products’ accessibility and ease of use. Maha Care will help customers be better educated about what they are putting on their skin and hair, unlike other companies that use vague ingredient lists. A premium-grade, organic product, sold at a reasonable price, produced by an accountable company would differentiate Maha Care from the other products on the shelf. It would provide a truly refined experience to its customers.
Color Scheme Development
Therefore, I chose colors that reflect natural, transparent, and approachable hair care products. On top of that, I softened up the colors and chose a serif font for an elegant look.
Logo Ideation
Logo Evolution
towards THE SOLUTIONS
HI-FI WIREFRAMES
After presenting our work, the client was very happy about the new colors and the logo. We proceeded to the next and final stage. We designed high-fidelity wireframes while keeping the following things in mind:
  • Information should be highly discoverable
  • Icons and photos used should give a natural, yet refined look
  • Text should be concise and easy to read, so that users can focus on the product

our recommendation

Once we finished the design, we handed it over to the client who then deployed it on Shopify. At this moment, we are waiting to see if our target user base, who we built based on our research, respond to the design overhaul after rounds of continuous Instagram marketing.
Although we recommended Maha Care to perform additional user interviews with real users, the baseline user interviews consisted of potential users, rather than the current Maha Care users. Therefore, to get more precise results and achieve a lower bounce rate for new customers, we have to listen to the current users’ wants and pain points.