Almosafer is one of the MENA region's leading travel platforms. But while flights and hotels had mature, well-performing surfaces, the Activities section was being left behind.
The homepage was the first thing users saw when exploring things to do — and it wasn't working. It failed to inspire, failed to surface the right content, and failed to convert browsers into bookers.
My role was to lead the end-to-end revamp of the Activities homepage — from diagnosing what was broken to designing a new experience that made people actually want to explore.
Activities is a high-margin vertical for Almosafer — but it was underperforming against its potential. The homepage was the entry point for discovery, and it was letting the whole vertical down.
Travel planners in the MENA region — often browsing casually, looking for inspiration. They need to be sparked by what they see. Emotion drives discovery in travel.
Redesign the Activities homepage to dramatically improve discovery, engagement, and booking conversion — while establishing a distinct visual identity for the vertical.
"Users are landing on the Activities page and leaving without clicking anything. We have great experiences to offer — but the homepage isn't making them feel it."
Everything competed for attention equally. Users scanned the page and found nothing compelling enough to stop on. In travel, the first moment of inspiration is everything. This page had none.
The most exciting activities weren't surfaced prominently. Heatmap data confirmed: engagement dropped sharply after the first two content rows.
The page felt like a database, not a destination. Static layouts, generic copy, and flat imagery gave users no emotional reason to engage.
Every user saw the same page regardless of location, browsing history, or travel intent. No personalisation meant no relevance — and no reason to act.
Worked with the data team to analyse behaviour using Google Analytics and heatmapping tools. Key findings: high bounce rate, low scroll depth, and near-zero engagement below the fold. The data told us exactly where attention was — and wasn't — going.
Audited Viator, GetYourGuide, Airbnb Experiences, Klook, and regional competitors. Identified patterns that consistently drove engagement: editorial-style layouts, mood-led imagery, category anchors, and contextual recommendations.
Facilitated workshops with the Activities product team, marketing, and content stakeholders. Surfaced business priorities and aligned the design direction with commercial goals from the start — so the redesign was strategically grounded, not just aesthetically stronger.
"The old page looked like we were trying to show everything at once. Users needed to feel something — a spark — before they'd ever click. We were giving them a list when we should've been giving them a feeling."
— Shahad Altayeb, reflecting on the discovery phase
Replaced the generic grid header with a bold, full-width editorial hero — a single immersive visual designed to evoke the excitement of the activity. Art-directed to feel like a magazine spread, not a product listing.
Redesigned the page architecture to unfold like a narrative — from broad inspiration at the top, to category anchors, to specific activity recommendations. Users are guided from "what experience do I want?" to "this exact activity."
Introduced location-aware content modules — surfacing activities near the user's city or upcoming travel destination. Users stopped seeing a catalogue; they started seeing a curated recommendation.
Established a visual language for Activities — warmer, more expressive, more editorial than Flights and Hotels. Worked with content and marketing to define photography direction, typography pairing, and colour usage.
Significant increase in click-through — users who previously bounced were now exploring. Heatmaps showed engagement distributed across the full page.
Higher activity booking conversions following the redesign. Clearer path from inspiration to booking directly drove commercial impact for the vertical.
Activities now has a clear, ownable design identity — distinct from Flights and Hotels, consistently applied across the homepage and downstream pages.
In travel, logic gets people to the search bar — but emotion gets them to book. Treating inspiration as a hard UX requirement, not a decorative afterthought, was the key shift.
The old homepage had all the right content — it just had no story. Redesigning the information architecture to guide users through a narrative was what unlocked engagement.
The workshops at the start meant that when we presented the redesign, it was a confirmation of a direction we'd built together — not a surprise. Faster sign-off, smoother implementation.