Hotel & Resort Management
India-focused hospitality marketplace — 45 screens covering property discovery across 6 categories, 4-step booking funnel with GST transparency and UPI integration, dining, activities, and B2B advertising. Designed solo for a confidential Zerozilla client.
My Role
Sole Product Designer
Duration
1–2 months
Year
2023
Tools
Figma
Project Brief
Design a B2C hospitality marketplace — discovery, search, multi-property booking across 6 property types, 4-step checkout with Indian payment methods (UPI, PhonePe, Google Pay), GST transparency, dining, activities, and B2B advertising — adapted for the Indian market.
India-focused hospitality marketplace — 45 screens covering property discovery across 6 categories, 4-step booking funnel with GST transparency and UPI integration, dining, activities, and B2B advertising. Designed solo for a confidential Zerozilla client.
The Problem
6 hospitality categories. No unified booking platform for India. Hotels, resorts, villas, activities, dining, and courses — each needed separate apps in the Indian short-break market.
India's short-break travel market was fragmented: OYO for budget hotels, MakeMyTrip for packages, separate apps for activities. The client wanted a single platform serving leisure travellers — with INR pricing, UPI/PhonePe/Google Pay, and GST breakdowns as table stakes.
No unified short-break platform
Booking a resort, activity, and dining for a weekend required 3 separate platforms — no combined checkout, no shared guest profile.
Indian payment methods not standard
UPI, PhonePe, Google Pay, Net Banking — dominant in India but treated as secondary options in most hospitality platforms.
GST transparency required
Indian B2C bookings require visible GST breakdown in checkout — legally required and a trust signal for consumers.
Activities had no discovery layer
Leisure travellers planning a resort weekend also want activities and dining — these had no discoverable category in the same platform.
UX Audit
What was broken before we redesigned
A heuristic evaluation of the existing system identified these critical issues before any design decisions were made.
INR pricing not properly handled
Reference platforms used international models. INR, GST display, and UPI are table stakes for Indian B2C.
Market Fit6 property types, no unified search
Hotels, Resorts, Villas, Activities, Courses, More — no shared search and filter architecture.
IA GapNo GST transparency
Visible GST breakdown in checkout is legally required and a trust signal — missing from reference models.
Compliance GapOur approach: One platform for the Indian weekend getaway
Unified discovery layer with search across 6 property types (Hotels, Resorts, Villas, Activities, Courses, More). 4-step booking funnel (Room Selection → Guest Details → Special Requests → Payment) with coupon engine, GST transparency, and UPI/PhonePe/Google Pay/Net Banking. Cross-sell between bookings, dining, and activities.
Process & Approach
How I approached the challenge
Platform Architecture
Mapped 6 property types, booking funnel stages, account management flows, dining and activities cross-sell, and B2B advertising section.
Discovery + Search Design
Homepage hero with unified search (destination, dates, guests), 6-tab listing grid, date+guest filter, availability-state cards.
4-Step Booking Funnel
Room Selection + coupon → Guest Details → Special Requests → Payment (GST breakdown + UPI/PhonePe/Google Pay/Net Banking/Card). Success, failure, and partial payment states.
Full Platform Design
45 screens: Discovery, Search, Property Detail (anchor-link sub-nav, 10+ sections), Booking funnel, Auth (Sign In, Sign Up, Guest Checkout), Dining, Activities, Account Management, B2B Advertise.
Design Principles
The Indian short-break deserves a native experience
UPI, GST, INR — not afterthoughts. First-class decisions that communicate platform credibility to Indian consumers.
Indian payment methods as trust signals
UPI and PhonePe aren't niche options in India — they're the primary method for 60%+ of digital transactions. Their presence in checkout communicates 'built for India'.
GST transparency = booking confidence
Showing GST breakdown in the booking summary isn't just a legal requirement — it's a trust signal. Indian consumers are trained to expect it and suspicious when it's absent.
Cross-sell earns more than separate tabs
Property bookings that surface nearby dining and activities get higher booking value. The cross-sell architecture is designed as discovery — not upsell popups.
Anchor-link navigation for long pages
A property detail page with 10+ sections (Rooms, Activities, Gallery, Reviews, Policies, Map) needed anchor-link sub-navigation — no pagination, no page loads, full scanning control.
A hospitality marketplace for India that ignores UPI, GST, and INR is a hospitality marketplace for someone else's market.
Why This Was Hard
Complexity signals
What set this project apart from standard product design work — the technical, systemic, and domain-specific challenges that demanded real depth.
6 property types in one search
Hotels, Resorts, Villas, Activities, Courses, More — unified search with shared filter system, tab-based listing grid, and availability-state cards.
4-step booking funnel with GST
Room Selection → Guest Details → Special Requests → Payment — coupon engine, availability-state detection, GST line-item breakdown, partial payment state.
Indian payment method matrix
UPI (QR), PhonePe, Google Pay, Net Banking, Card — all first-class options in checkout with GST registration and tax compliance built in.
Property detail anchor-navigation
Single property detail page with 10+ content sections and anchor-link sub-nav (Overview, Rooms, Activities, Gallery, Reviews, Policies, Map) — no pagination.
45 screens. 6 property types. 4-step checkout. Indian payment methods. GST. Cross-sell architecture. Solo designer.
UI Screens
45 screens
India-market hospitality marketplace — 6 property types, 4-step booking, Indian payment methods.
Feature Highlights
Platform capabilities
Unified Multi-Category Search
Hero search across Hotels, Resorts, Villas, Activities, Courses — date picker, guest count, destination — one query, 6 listing tabs.
Discovery UX4-Step Booking Funnel
Room Selection + coupon → Guest Details → Special Requests → Payment (GST breakdown + UPI/PhonePe/Google Pay/Net Banking/Card).
Checkout UXIndian Payment Methods
UPI, PhonePe, Google Pay, Net Banking, Card — first-class options in checkout with GST line-item breakdown per Indian tax law.
Market AdaptationB2B Advertise With Us
Lead capture for property owners and activity providers — tiered feature listing and enquiry form for platform partnership.
B2B RevenueDesign System
Tokens, typography & components
A shared token-based system built to ensure consistency across every screen and state.
Color Tokens
Type Scale
Components
User Flow
Core booking journey
Discovery
6 categories
Search Results
Filter + sort
Property Detail
10+ sections
Payment
UPI + GST
Confirmation
Booking success
Tech Stack
Design tools
Design
My Contribution
What I owned
01
Sole Product Designer
Platform architecture, 6-category discovery, 4-step booking funnel, Indian payment methods, dining and activities, B2B advertising. All 45 screens in Figma.
Impact & Performance
Project scope
45
Screens designed
6
Property categories
4
Checkout steps
6+
Payment methods
Timeline
1–2 months: architecture to full platform
Architecture + Discovery
Scope mapping, 6-category IA, homepage, search and listing, property detail page (10+ anchor sections).
Booking Funnel + Full System
4-step checkout (GST + UPI), auth flows, dining, activities, account management, booking states, B2B advertising.
Outcomes
The impact we shipped
Measured results from usability testing, stakeholder reviews, and post-launch adoption tracking.
45
Screens designed
6
Property types
4
Checkout steps
6+
Payment methods
"Delivered a complete hospitality marketplace — 45 screens covering the full consumer journey from discovery through booking and checkout — adapted for the Indian market with INR, UPI, GST, and cross-category discovery."
Learnings & Reflection
What I'd do differently
01
Payment method research is market research
Understanding UPI, PhonePe, and GST requirements required researching Indian consumer behaviour and legal requirements — not just UX patterns. Market research and payment UX are the same conversation in Indian product design.
Interested in working together?
Let's talk about your project or open role.
Live Prototype