The Challenge
Hilton’s legacy navigation suffered from cognitive overload, featuring 10+ top-level items that obscured key booking services and B2B resources. On mobile, this complexity led to high bounce rates and an inconsistent user experience across 20+ distinct hotel brands.
Role
Senior UX Designer
(Experience Design)
Team
- Accessibility
- Research
- Experience Design
- Product
- Brand Marketing
- Software Engineering
- Quality Engineering
The Double Diamond Process
1. Discover: Deep Research & Stakeholder Alignment
To “design the right thing,” I began by diverging to understand the vast enterprise landscape:
- Stakeholder Workshops: Facilitated sessions with Brand Marketing, Software Engineering, and Product teams to identify competing business needs and technical constraints.
- User Pain Point Identification: Through research and data analysis, we identified significant “decision fatigue” caused by unclear labeling and deep page nesting.
- Audit of Brand Diversity: Analyzed the unique requirements of various properties—from luxury (Waldorf Astoria) to midscale—to ensure the new system supported both Global Identity and Local Property Adoption.
2. Define: Strategic Information Architecture
Next, I converged to synthesize findings into a focused strategy:
- IA Restructuring: Partnered with Content Design to prioritize high-value user pathways and reduce page depth, creating a more intuitive hierarchy.
- Strategic Alignment: Established clear design goals: increase mobile conversion, unify cross-brand UX, and improve the discoverability of enterprise resources.
3. Develop: Iterative Mobile-First Design
Moving to the second diamond, I explored solutions that prioritized accessibility and scalability:
- Scalable Drawer Layout: Developed a mobile-first drawer system using a parent-child category model to handle large-scale content without sacrificing speed.
- Accessibility Integration: Collaborated with the Accessibility team to ensure the navigation was fully compliant, featuring clear touch targets and screen-reader-friendly structures.
- Prototyping & Rapid Iteration: Utilized the Double Diamond’s iterative nature to explore various B2B and partner connection placements within the global flow.
4. Deliver: Global Implementation & Localization
Finally, we converged on a solution ready for enterprise-wide rollout:
- Localized Flexibility: Integrated an in-navigation language selector and flexible labeling systems to support localization efforts across international markets.
- Standardized Framework: Delivered a comprehensive design system framework that serves as the blueprint for all Hilton web properties.
- A/B Testing Readiness: Built the navigation to support rapid A/B testing, allowing for data-driven optimizations of content clarity and user engagement.
Outcomes & Impact
- Enterprise Standardization: Now the global standard across all Hilton web properties, ensuring a cohesive brand experience.
- Conversion Growth: Successfully boosted mobile bookings and increased time-on-site by reducing friction in the discovery phase.
- Reduced Bounce Rates: Significant improvement in navigation clarity led to a measurable decrease in mobile user abandonment.
Reflection
This project demonstrated that simplicity is the ultimate form of scalability. By leveraging the Double Diamond to align diverse stakeholders and focus on user mental models, we transformed a fragmented system into a high-performing enterprise asset.