Manit Maru

So, my name is Manik Maru. I have been in this design industry for almost 8 years and I have a total of 6 years of relevant experience as a UI/UX designer. Before that, I started my career as a graphic designer. So, overall, I have been in this design industry for almost 8 years. Before I joined my current role, I was designing mobile layouts and websites, especially for the hospitality sector, where I designed almost 30 designs for hospitality giants like Ramada, Marriott, and Choice Hotels, as well as Ayat Residency and other hospitality giants. My main role is to perform design process audits, where we identify and track users' behavior, including where users look, their eye movements, touch, and clicks, and analyze the resulting data. We then revamp projects to achieve specific customer engagement. I have almost revamped 5 websites and achieved almost 30% user engagement. In addition, I handled the social media accounts of 15 clients, promoting their offers and deals through graphics and video. I also achieved an AKR of almost 96%, which was a goal set by our organization. Furthermore, I provided training to four of my team members who were not engaged with social media, during my notice period. That's all from my side. Yeah.

So, when it comes to designing a user story or a user journey, first of all, we have to identify the problem statement and the pain points and objectives that the stakeholders have. After getting all the insights from that, after getting all those statements from the stakeholders and the users, we have to identify how to achieve this problem statement. For that, we have to create a user journey or a user story where one particular goal is achieved by achieving that particular goal. In that phase, we have to figure out that there should be a particular roadmap for the user to achieve that particular goal, right? We have to segment that particular goal into different sections or steps so that the user can easily interact with our product. This is the ideal case where we have to achieve or identify that we can conduct a session where users actually can, we can give a particular task to users to achieve some particular goal, right? Based on that insight, we can figure out what will be the best step out of it and what kind of path actually users are taking to achieve a particular goal. Based on that, we can go with that option to make the user journey more seamless.

Could you describe the challenge you faced while designing for responsive web mobile apps and how you overcame it? Yes, so there are challenges when designing for particular responsive designs. Even I face many problems designing for a responsive design. When it comes to website design, we have a large canvas out there, making it easy to design a particular element on the web. However, when it comes to a responsive design, we have a limited canvas, and we cannot accommodate all elements on a mobile responsive design. To figure this out, we need to overcome the challenges for particular elements. I remember a scenario where I had multiple steps for KYC on a website. In the responsive design, I converted these steps into a carousel, allowing users to easily interact with the element without cognitive load. Another challenge was with event calendars. On websites, we have a large panel, making it easy to create event calendar elements. However, on mobile design, it was challenging. To overcome this challenge, I converted the elements into icons, which can be shown in less area and on the basis of that, we can show responsiveness in mobile access. This way, users can relate both things at the same time. This is the website, and this is the mobile layout.

I'm not sure about this question, to be honest.

So Figma is my best tool for UI UX designing. So why Figma? Because Figma is cloud-based, so we can easily work with it without any system load or anything like that. Apart from that, Figma is an independent application. For that, we don't have to depend on the operating system. Right? It's a cloud-based application. We just need an internet connection. So it and it's easy to use. Apart from that, Figma is a lightweight version. It's easy to navigate without any load. Plus, it has more team collaboration features. We can easily work on one project with different team members. Okay? So this is the advantage of that thing. So I like Figma more. And one more thing. There is a feature which I'm liking more about Figma. It is like, it gives you a tool for UX research that is FigJam. Right? We use it for user research where we dial in and make notes. We can design that process out there. We can design the user flow out there. Right? So that is the reason I'm liking Figma more. And this is the tool I'm using for UI UX design.

Yes, for this, I remember one of the scenarios where I had to face a challenge in the user group. It was an application of an educational platform. It is a one-stop solution for the educator and the trainers who are giving trainings and teaching on different subjects, right? So, it was from a region, we say, from Israel. So the challenge was like, okay, we are designing in that English language, so it's left to right, and that another language, which is Hebrew or Arabic, it's from right to left, right? So it was a bit challenging task for me. And I was more feeling that I had more complexity in understanding the user's flow. Okay, so actually, when we are designing for left to right, it's quite easy. But when it comes to the RTL part, it will be difficult for me to design a workflow, sorry, user flow out there. So I just recommended, I just put my queries in front of my stakeholders saying that, okay, I'm not familiar with this region. Okay, so can you just elaborate on what kind of users there are, how users are interacting with RTL kind of layouts, so that I can understand the user's need, right? I can understand how users are interacting with this particular digital devices, right? So it will be helpful for me to create a seamless kind of user flow to give them a seamless experience, right? So by visualizing all those things, I approached the stakeholders saying that I need some kind of data, where I want to understand how RTL language is going to work. For that, I had researched on Google, I had gone through the material design where I got some points related to RTL, how to design a particular flow for the RTL languages, right? So, I collaborated all inputs from that material design and from the stakeholders. And I presented it with a minimal amount of effort to solve it.

We have to consider all people who are specially able, like those who are visually impaired. When it comes to accessibility, we have to make sure that our colors, forms, and elements are diversely accepted by the group of people who cannot see things properly and can interact with them properly. We are designing for the entire age group and people who have physical problems, such as eye-related issues. To achieve this, we have to ensure that we are giving more contrast colors so that people who cannot see light colors easily can identify them easily. We have to identify the font we are choosing. If we choose fonts that give a strain to the user, it will be an issue. So, we have to use fonts, colors, and everything by considering all our audiences.

I describe a technique I use for testing and the writing design. Yes. So, basically, I could say I have used different tech different testing techniques for testing. So one of them, I have used in one of my projects where I used A/B testing. And, like, I achieved almost 30% or more increment in user engagement. So, basically, I conduct A/B testing there. So I have composed two versions related to website revamp design where I designed tool layouts and submitted them to the stakeholders. Once they had seen those designs, we approached a nominal group of 10 to 15 people and ran this testing. So we gave them a particular task, saying, "What kind of design do you like, or which of the two designs do you prefer?" By this testing, it gave us an insight about which option to choose. So by conducting that user testing and getting insights from it, I made some iterations. I made some changes and finally submitted that project. And later on, before it was around 5% of engagement, they were getting. And after that, usability testing and iterating the designs, we achieved almost 30% in customer engagement.

So, this is an approach to water limitation. I remember one of my projects where a client was associated with an AI-based platform. They provide AI services. In that way, we had to figure out how to use AI to identify images and all graphical presentations showing the aestheticity of the AI model. I remember it was a big challenge for me to design graphics that give an impact of an AI domain. It was a bit challenging, and I can say we cannot compose it with Figma or Adobe Photoshop. To address this, I communicated with my team lead and said that I was facing these issues. I also explained that I couldn't create this kind of graphics with the tools we had. Later, after I pointed this out to my team lead, I recalled a tool I had come across while scrolling through a Medium article at home. I remembered that tool was Mid Journey. I got my answer from there. I started using Mid Journey and created graphics that give a high aestheticity to the AI domain. By typing a prompt, I created lots of graphics, and this is how I solved the issue.

Yeah. So I remember one scenario where I was actually designing a mobile application. Okay. So it was not actually a mobile application. It was a responsive design where we had to figure out the menu style. Right? So, in the website, we have a horizontal layout. We can easily use that layout and show the menu on the top. But when it comes to a mobile, we had to identify how this layout would be used on a mobile. Right? So in that way, I said to the developer team, "When it comes to a particular website design, just go with the horizontal bar. And when it comes to a mobile, then switch to a horizontal bar with a hamburger icon. And use that change in the mobile and tablet according to screen sizes." When it comes to a laptop, it should be horizontal. When it comes to an HD screen, it should be horizontal. But when it comes to a 722, 360, or 375 mobile application scenario, it will narrow down, and it will replace with a hamburger menu so that we can easily switch between screens and without hampering the design's aesthetic. So this is the way I solved the development process by using

Till this time, I'm more engaged with the UI UX thing. So, actually, I don't have experience in that particular field of HTML and CSS. But, yes, I have knowledge that, okay, while designing a particular element, we have to consider whether it should be possible with the HTML or CSS part. Right? But I have never introduced myself in that field of HTML CSS to write down the syntax and all. So I'm not able to answer this question.