Modernizing Ulta’s Mobile Experience
Evaluating usability and visual consistency through heuristics, competitive research, and strategic concept design.
The Project
Ulta’s mobile app plays a central role in customer engagement, enabling users to shop, manage loyalty rewards, and book in-store services. As part of a proactive effort to win new client work, I led a heuristic evaluation of the mobile app, applying UX best practices to identify friction points and recommend improvement opportunities. The final delivery included an annotated heuristics review, a competitive analysis of peer apps, and mobile concept designs that demonstrated what a refreshed experience could look like.
The Challenge
An Experience That Needed a Modern UX Lens
While the Ulta app supported many customer needs, the user experience lacked polish and consistency in key areas. Critical shopping and navigation interactions showed signs of poor usability—resulting in confusing flows, missing feedback, and visual hierarchy issues. Our challenge was to evaluate the app from an expert UX lens, validate gaps with heuristic principles, and articulate how the app could evolve to meet modern expectations.
The Research
Uncovering Friction with Heuristic Analysis
Using the Nielsen Norman Group’s 10 Usability Heuristics, I audited the entire app experience. For each heuristic, I evaluated specific UI elements and flows using annotated screenshots in Miro. I assessed severity across:​​​
In parallel, I conducted lightweight benchmarking against key competitors: Sephora, Target, and Glossier. Each was evaluated for navigation, visual clarity, personalization, loyalty integration, and product detail experiences. This helped contextualize how Ulta’s mobile experience compared to modern eCommerce standards.
The Key Findings + Strategic Solution
10 Heuristics, 1 App, 100+ Observations
​Recurring issues across heuristics included:​​​​
Lack of visual feedback and status indicators during key interactions
Overloaded or cluttered product screens with poor hierarchy
Inconsistent design language across sections
Missing personalization and efficient ways to adjust experience
Pitching the Vision for a Better App
I built and delivered a full deck summarizing the heuristic evaluation, competitive analysis, and concept directions. Once the audit was complete, I synthesized the highest impact usability concerns into five strategic opportunity areas that directly aligned with Ulta's business goals and user expectations:
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Improve Findability & Navigation – Simplify how users access common actions like reordering, managing profiles, or finding rewards. This included proposed updates to labeling, navigation structure, and overall hierarchy.
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Elevate Product Pages & Shopping UX – Redesign product cards and PDPs for greater clarity and scan-ability, making it easier for users to browse, compare, and purchase.
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Surface Loyalty & Rewards Upfront – Increase visibility and contextual awareness of Ulta’s loyalty program throughout the journey—from homepage to checkout.
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Support Faster Reordering & Discovery – Introduce UI patterns that enable quick reordering, surface personalized suggestions, and support more efficient repeat shopping behaviors.
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Align UX with Brand Expression – Close the gap between Ulta’s bold, vibrant brand and its current mobile execution by refining visuals, interactions, and tone to create a more cohesive and engaging experience.
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These five themes were supported by visuals and interaction mockups that helped stakeholders clearly connect audit insights to practical improvements. Rather than presenting isolated issues, the presentation told a strategic story: one that tied UX gaps to loyalty engagement, conversion, and overall brand experience. While speculative, the pitch generated strong interest and helped reinforce our team's value as a design and strategy partner.
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To demonstrate quick-win improvements, I created concept designs for a refreshed app experience.
Focus areas included:
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Simplified product card with stronger hierarchy (title, price, CTA)
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Bottom navigation redesign for clearer IA and labeling
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Loyalty rewards surfaced earlier in the journey
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Booking experience with progress feedback and visual clarity
These mockups were presented side-by-side with current screens to clearly show impact.
The Impact & Learnings
Turning Expert Critique Into Actionable Value
This project reinforced the value of structured evaluations, especially when paired with competitive benchmarking and visual storytelling. Heuristic audits allowed me to examine not just the product’s surface issues but the systemic inconsistencies shaping the experience. Most importantly, it helped me understand how small interface decisions can either support or clash with different users’ mental models—shaping how intuitive or frustrating a journey feels. It was a reminder that usability isn’t just about polish; it’s about aligning expectations, behaviors, and context at every touchpoint.
