UX Research Case Study :
Discovering OVO User Behaviour during the Pandemic
Recently, I have been working on a study about one of the e-wallets in Indonesia called OVO. These studies are happening because I would like to discover OVO users' behaviour during the pandemic to obtain their pain points and needs.
This case study details how the research process that I did alone during the pandemic in 2021. I used several methods for this project, such as a survey, Interview, and feedback form from the App Store and Play store. But first, let me explain the background of this research a bit.
My Role
In this project, I became the UX Researcher to research while also creating the analysis for this report.
The Background
OVO is the leading digital payment player in Indonesia. OVO also has a payment case through their partners, such as Tokopedia and Grab. During this pandemic, many users do more transactions at Grab and Tokopedia using OVO as their payment method.
But, there are fewer who do transactions at the OVO App itself. As this problem happens, this research is needed to gain insights from users what transaction they already did in Grab and Tokopedia while also gathering the insights about OVO payment between the partner apps and OVO App.
What I want to learn
From this research, I would like to learn more about why more people less do the transaction in the OVO own app during the pandemic (because OVO it’s a digital wallet company who partnered with some e-commerce and merchant) to create an efficient way for people to start using the OVO app. So if I had to make a shorter explanation would be :
To understand why people less do the transaction in the OVO app during the pandemic in order to create an efficient way for people to start using the OVO App
Then after knowing the problem statement, I tried to construct the research question to clarify the research more :
Research Question
- How is their transactional habit during the pandemic?
- What kind of transaction have they already done during the pandemic?
- What kind of apps that they use for OVO payment?
- How people use the OVO during the pandemic?; What their consideration of using the OVO during the pandemic? How they feel about using OVO?
- What problems do they encounter from using OVO?
- What kind of improvements would they make to their overall experience of using OVO?
What is being researched :
This research will research the idea and concept of the OVO application both in Playstore or in Appstore. This research will try to uncover why they did not use the OVO application to have a transaction. This also researched generative research means it is used to collect the data from the product that has been launched to the market.
Then after knowing all of this, I could make the research objective for this research which is :
Research Objective
- Identify user's transactional behaviour during pandemic using digital payment.
- Discover users end to end process of using OVO from partner apps and OVO App
- Identify users problem while using OVO during their transaction
Methodology
After knowing the objective, and the research question, I decided to go with Semi-Structured In-depth Interviews to go with this research. I decided to use this after knowing that I need to discover the reason and they're attitudinal about the user. User Interview is the most suitable for obtaining Qualitative Research.
But I also came up with a simple survey on my Instagram Account to obtain the quantitative research and search for the participant for this research.
And for the screening itself, these are the participants that I looked for to have an interview session with me.
Participant Profiles
1. Users using OVO as their payment method for their transaction during the pandemic
2. Users that already did a minimum of two transactions within three months ago.
3. Users who have already have the latest version or the newest update within three months ago partners apps (Tokopedia or Grab) and OVO app
Then these are the participant demographics that I got for the Interview session after selecting from the online survey that I held in Instagram Story.
Insight Research: Instagram Mini Survey
Through the Instagram Mini Survey, I would like to invite a respondent to have an Interview session if the requirements meet, so I decided to ask several questions using polling to gain the quantitative data according to my follower. This result might not be 100% accurate based on the OVO’s users demographic because it’s only limited to my followers on Instagram, which has a demographic between 19–25. This is several questions that I ask on Instagram :
1. Apakah pernah kamu menggunakan OVO untuk bertransaksi di tahun selama tahun 2020? (Have you ever used OVO in 2020?)
2. Kira kira, Berapa kali kamu sudah melakukan transaksi menggunakan OVO di sepanjang tahun 2020? (How many times have you already used OVO in 2020?)
3. Kapan terakhir kali kamu melakukan transaksi menggunakan OVO? (When the last time you used OVO?)
4. Aplikasi apa yang kamu gunakan untuk bertransaksi menggunakan OVO? (What apps that you used to have a transaction using a OVO?)
and this is the result of the Instagram Mini Survey :
85% of respondent said that they used OVO in 2020, while the others 15% were never used OVO in 2020
58 respondent was using OVO more than three times in 2020. It means that OVO is commonly used during the pandemic for having an online transaction. While 6 respondents said only twice for using the OVO and 3 responded only used OVO three times, only one responded said only used OVOonce.
Most of the respondent (49 respondent) said that the last time they used OVO was this month (February 2021).
Most of the respondent said they used OVO frequently on Partner app such as Grab with 38 Respondent, Tokopedia 13 Respondent. While the OVO app itself only 15 respondent, they used it to have a transaction during the pandemic.
By knowing these result, I could know that.
- The hypothesis that most of the OVO users did not use the OVO app to have a transaction during the pandemic era is correct because based on the data, most of the respondent used partner apps such as Grab and Tokopedia to have a transaction in 2020 and early 2021
To know further about the reason behind this result, a Semi-Structured In-depth Interview is needed to discover the “why” of this result.
Insight Research: User Interview
When I had to draw outcomes from the research, I used thematic analysis to find the pattern and know the similarity between one answer and another answer from the Interview. In this research, I used Miro as my tool to collect the data and create an affinity mapping for each category. for this research. I find interesting data that I would like to explain below :
What factors that influence participant to have a transaction :
1. Some participant said that Promotion and cashback is an important decision to have a transaction
“Faktor faktor cashback terus voucher yang bisa digunakan untuk uang elektronik ”
“ Jadi promo itu sangat berpengaruh untuk menentukan platform digital yang akan digunakan.”
2. Some participant considering the ease of the application for payment and transaction
“Faktor user interface dalam aplikasi mempengaruhi transaksiku karena jika user interfacenya itu tidak bagus maka akan mengurangi kenayaman dalam melakukan transaksi”
“cari yang praktis dan mudah (Journey mudah itu berpengaruh dalam pemilihan platform digital)”
Why are they more likely to use partner apps rather than the OVO app itself? it is mainly because…
- The perks and benefit that partners app (Tokopedia and Grab) trying offers compared to OVO
“Soalnya yang bisa menyediakan voucher voucher itu tokopedia bukan OVO” (Tokopedia offer a lot of voucher rather than OVO)
“ kalau ditokopedia itu ada cashbacknya dan kalau di OVO itu tidak ada kupon kupon, Benefinya kuran di banding tokopedia (There are a lot of cash back in Tokopedia instead of in OVO)
2. Partners apps like Grab and Tokopedia offers a complete package in one app compared to OVO
“aplikasi OVO nya itu kurang luas jangkauannya, sehingga aplikasi ovo tidak diperlukan karena di Grab sudah di banyak di sediakan” (OVO App is not have a lot of features inside of it, While Grab offers a complete package in one App)
“Kalau tokopedia itu menyediakan pembayaran yang lengkap dari pada OVO” (Tokopedia is more complete than OVO)
Some of the participant facing problem while using an OVO App itself that makes them not considering to use the OVO App again and move to partner apps
“kayaknya aku lagi isi pulsa terus dia memang lagi provider nya trouble tapi saldo OVO jadinya tidak masuk pulsanya” (There were trouble while top up some credit in OVO and the Credit is not top up yet)
“Ketika aku transfer sesama OVO aku ngirim tapi transaksi gagal tapi saldo ku kepotong, tapi sistem dan juga di history itu gak onok tapi dari yang dari penerima” (Transfer Problem using a OVO)
”Pernah pending jadi pernah delay transfer sehingga harus mengulang lagi untuk transfer” (Transfer Problem using a OVO)
Also, some participant considering not using OVO again because of :
- The cashback and promotion are not on the same level with other e-wallets:
“Balik lagi dari cashback apakah lebih besar OVO dari pada yang lainnya”
“Kerja sama yang tidak eksklusif yang akhirnya membuat berhenti untuk menggunakan OVO”
“cashbacknya berupa uang dan pointsnya itu terpisah dari lain dan menggunakannya itu terbatas tidak bisa seluruhnya langsung”.
2. The top-up policy changes :
“Minimal top — up OVO bertambah sehingga tidak bisa top — up dengan jumlah yang kecil”
3. There are some bad reviews on the internet and play store/app store :
“review atau gossip dari internet itu bisa membuat aku untuk menggunakan OVO”
Key Outcomes
- Most of the participants does not use the OVO App frequently, or some participants never use the OVO App because the services that OVO App tried to offer si limited compared to the partner's app such as Tokopedia and Grab
- The benefit and perks such as a voucher, discount or cashback on the OVO app are less than the partner's apps such as Tokopedia.
- Most participants also face the problem while having a transaction on the OVO app itself, such as transferring and buying the data. One of the participant consideration to have a transaction is the ease of the application, which does not represent what users want.
Conclusion
By knowing all of the results of this research, I could answer all of the objectives that I have created before, which I have already explained in the Key Outcomes. I also face difficulty during this research which is collecting the exact data from the users is quite difficult because I don’t have enough data from the user, and the time limit makes the survey not last long. It’s only last for two days. However, I am already satisfied with this kind of result because it proves to me that I was already growing so much instead of back then in 2020 when I first discovered my career path becoming a UX Researcher.
There was a limitation on this research which is not covered all the entire demographic such as the older generation, because I believe they also had a different opinion about OVO in 2020 and 2021. So it could be improved in the future by doing a large scale survey through an app or OVO Community. And here is my recommendation for OVO that you could consider implemented to boost your user on the OVO app.
Recommendation
- Give a benefit and perks that make users want to use OVO App to the transaction, such as using OVO Pay later or making a hyperlink to order food from OVO App while not using it Grab or link it from OVO app to Grab app using a hyperlink.
- • Try to a partnership with some minimarket and SME’s to scale up the users of OVO because some participant did not have mobile banking or any digital payment to top up the OVO, and it is quite troublesome if OVO did not partner with any mainstream minimarket such as Indomaret or Alfamart Group
- Try to do usability testing within an OVO App because some of my participants said they face a problem while using the OVO app to have a transaction. It also has to be a priority because OVO is a digital product, and I also look up to the play store review that they said they have a problem with the app.
