User experience of a web-based platform for poultry market linkages in Tanzania

In Tanzania the advancement of technology has brought about affordable smartphones to most of livestock farmers. However, despite this potential, livestock farmers have limited utilization and access to livestock information systems to improve their business. Poultry farming has business potential in Tanzania but farmers in the sector are challenged on reliable market linkage information systems to interface with buyers for their products. Poultry farmers are equally challenged on limited exposure to technology. The aim of this study was to develop a web-based platform for poultry market linkage with more focus on its usability and user experience (UX) design and assessment of the user experience. Eye tracking method combined with retrospective thinks aloud method together with facial expression was used to test user experience of the developed web-based platform. The results on eye tracking experiment for user experience indicated that users were emotionally happy when performing two tasks; 1) finding posts for advertisements on poultry and poultry products and 2) obtaining more information on advertised products. Users struggled on tasks for creating account on the web-based platform as well as purchasing items online on the platform. It is now more important than ever before that web applications provide a good user experience which was once considered luxury or an added expense.