UX STRAT Europe 2017 presentation by Judith Yaaquobi, Senior Product Owner, Booking.com: “Cultural Dimensions in International Product Development at Booking.com”

1. The use and usefulness of National Cultural
Dimensions in International Product Development
Judith Yaaqoubi | June 15, 2016

2. Judith Yaaqoubi
Doctoral Candidate at University of Washington
Senior Product Owner, Booking.com

3. Eight stunning
photos.
Booking.com in numbers
- Headquartered in Amsterdam
- 1.4m room nights per day
- 90 offices around the world
- 15,000 colleagues
- Development from three
continents

4. Booking.com

5. Global
Product

6. “In god we trust, all others bring
data.”
W. Edwards Deming

10. People make bad
decisions.
90% of product decisions have
an inconclusive or negative
effect on a product’s primary
metric
Source: VWO 2016.
90%
10%

11. How do we apply this model and
localis/ze
our product for different cultures?

12. Localis/zation
Adaptation of a product, application or document content to meet the language, cultural and
other requirements of a specific target market

13. ➔ Language & Formatting
➔ Norms and Conditions
➔ Values & Beliefs

14. Getting the basics
right. ➔ Language & Formatting
● Language
● Text length
● Fonts
● Spatial orientation
● Formats and forms, symbols
● Browser used in target market
● SEO
● Functional elements

16. Design for local requirements.

17. ➔ Norms & Conditions
● Customs
● Local competitors
● Policies
● Regulatory considerations

20. China - uses more apps Japan - prefers mobile web

24. ➔ Values & Beliefs

26. Dimensions of National Culture

27. 1. Power distance: the extent to which the less powerful persons in a society accept
inequality in power and consider it normal.
2. Individualism vs. Collectivism: the extent to which people are integrated into
tight social networks.
3. Masculinity vs. Femininity: the relative desirability of material success versus
quality of life and of assertive versus modest behavior.
4. Uncertainty avoidance: the extent to which people tolerate ambiguity and risk or
feel threatened by change.
5. Long Term/Short term orientation: the fostering of virtues oriented towards
future rewards (long term) or the fostering of virtues related to the past and
present
Hofstede’s Dimensions of National Culture

28. Power distance

29. Uncertainty
avoidance

30. Individualism

31. Cultural dimensions to
inform design interventions

33. China

36. Cultural dimensions for idea
generation

40. Cultural dimensions to
justify personal experiences and
intuitions

42. cultural models and the application
thereof is little known

43. local knowledge and first-hand
insights
still important

44. Thank you!

45. BONEYARD

52. Base.
Which one performed better?
Variant.

53. Base.
Which one performed better?
Variant.

54. ❏ Taxonomic account
❏ Generative account