Tawafona - Designing for the weight of intention
How I designed a booking platform where a user isn't just paying for a trip, they're fulfilling a religious obligation. Every UX decision carried the weight of that context.
How i was a full product designer across the entire booking experience
I owned the full design scope from understanding the user's emotional context and researching the market, to designing every screen of the booking funnel across web and mobile, and handing off a production-ready design system to developers.
UI/Visual Design | Research & Discovery | Design System | Search & Filter |
|---|---|---|---|
Booking & Checkout | Payment & Installments | Cancellation flow | Dev Handoff |
The anxiety map:
understanding what stops people from booking
Before any wireframe, I mapped every anxiety point a user carries into a religious trip booking experience. These aren't abstract UX concerns, they're real, documented fears that kill conversions in this specific category.
Scam fear | Religious | Complexity |
|---|---|---|
What if I pay and the company disappears or cancels? | Is this a legitimate, licensed company? | There are 50 packages that all look the same, how do I choose the right one? |
Commitment | Financial | Trust |
If I pay now and my situation changes, what happens? | I can't afford the full amount now, does that mean I can't book? | This website looks basic, is it even real? |
I designed the entire experience as a progressive trust ladder, each section of the interface deliberately resolves the anxiety from the previous one before introducing the next level of commitment.
The Problem:
Umrah and Hajj booking is one of the most complex, emotionally loaded purchases a person makes
The Challenge:
My design challenge was to make that proposition feel as trustworthy as the religious journey it enables.
Am not designing a checkout. I am designing the moment someone commits to one of the most important decisions of their life.
Success Metrics | |
|---|---|
Booking completion rate
|  |
Search-to-detail conversion
| Return visit before booking
|
Why I separated trust metrics from engagement metrics?A user who spends 20 minutes on the platform without booking isn't engaged, they're anxious. High time on site in this category can signal confusion, not interest. I defined metrics that distinguish confident exploration (filter usage, package comparison, provider profile views) from anxious hesitation (repeated homepage visits, checkout entry without completion). The difference tells me whether design is building confidence or just occupying attention. | |
Core design challenge: |
|---|
Getting a user to pay thousands online for a religious trip without calling anyone |
This is the hardest UX problem in the project. In the Umrah booking market, the default behavior is phone-first: users browse, then call a travel agent to confirm and pay. Moving that conversion online requires the interface to replace not just the transaction |
The checkout didn't need more features. It needed to feel like a person was standing next to the user saying: you're safe, this is real, you can do this.
The choices that shaped the product
Installment visibility moved to the search cardWhy: Users who need installments were filtering mentally before entering the funnel. Hiding this info until checkout caused drop-off from users who assumed they couldn't afford it. | Search filters built around user questions, not database fieldsWhy: Research showed users phrase their criteria as questions, not categories. Filters that match their mental model reduce cognitive load and increase filter usage. |
Mobile-first architecture, not responsive afterthoughtWhy: Research showed the majority of target users browse and intend to book on mobile. Designing web-first and adapting to mobile produces subtly broken experiences that erode trust. | Design system built for a multi-provider marketplaceWhy: When 20+ tourism companies supply content, visual inconsistency is inevitable unless the system enforces structure. Consistency is what makes a marketplace feel like one product, not a directory. |
