How Agile User Research Revamped the 7FRESH POS Experience

7FRESH POS machines are key self‑checkout touchpoints in stores, directly affecting efficiency and settlement experience. A joint redesign project by the 7FRESH business unit, user research team, and core platform design team used agile field research to understand user behavior, uncover existing experience issues, and propose actionable improvements.

Research Method

Offline on‑site agile research.

Research Goal

Identify pain points in the current POS settlement process and propose optimization solutions.

Research Scope

The self‑service POS operates in physical stores and involves users, products, apps/miniprograms, staff, materials, and environment. The study focused on new user onboarding, product entry, payment settlement, and staff guidance.

Execution Plan

(Image illustrating the plan)

Research Findings

Through notes, photos, and video, 47 issues were recorded, with 18 classified as severe (Grade A).

User Experience Map

Issues were prioritized by demand and technical feasibility, then organized into a user‑experience flow map for solution assignment.

Key Optimization Strategies

Strategy 1 – Strengthen User Guidance

1/Scenario Animation – Dynamic scene animations help users quickly grasp complex operations and convey emotion. The redesign adopts multiple scenario‑animation guides for clearer operation instructions.

(Image of animation GIF)

2/Highlight Discount Information and Gift Prompts – Research showed users focus on price and discounts during product entry. Improvements include:

Enhanced product display with prominent discount tags.

Added toast prompts for gifts and bulk‑purchase discounts.

Bottom‑layer overlay for detailed discount view.

(Image of discount UI)

3/Shopping Bag Purchase Guidance – Shopping bags require manual scanning. When the system detects five or more items, a bubble prompt appears on the bag button for 2.5 seconds, then disappears, shown only once per transaction.

(Image of shopping bag prompt)

Strategy 2 – Prioritize Efficiency, Reduce Redundancy

1/Product Card Animation Optimization – The previous 2‑second animation confirming each scanned item was removed. Four scenarios now dictate card behavior:

New product appears at the top.

Multiple units of one product share a card, emphasizing quantity change.

Gift items merge with the main product card and move to the top.

Bottom‑listed items added later slide to the top.

(Image of product card flow)

2/Simplify New‑User Acquisition Flow – Staff currently guide new users to scan a QR code for a WeChat public account, adding steps and causing friction. The redesign decouples the public account, directing users straight to the mini‑program homepage.

(Image of new‑user flow)

Strategy 3 – Optimize Settlement Methods

Mobile QR code payments have “scan‑to‑pay” (consumer scans merchant code) and “pay‑to‑scan” (merchant scans consumer code). The old POS only supported the latter. After market research and technical analysis, the new solution makes “scan‑to‑pay” primary, retains “pay‑to‑scan” and facial payment as secondary, and improves guidance for the secondary flow to lower learning cost.

(Image of payment method UI)

Conclusion

Agile research effectively pinpointed user pain points and guided rapid iteration. The 7FRESH team will continue applying this method to further enhance the offline experience.