In the high-stakes world of maritime procurement software, speed and insight are everything. Senior UX professionals know that lengthy development cycles and delayed user feedback can sink a product’s success. This article explores a game-changing approach: using interactive prototyping tools (like Lovable or Cursor) followed by rapid testing and click analytics with Maze. The result? A dramatically faster UX discovery process and better design outcomes. We’ll dive into specific maritime procurement UX challenges and see how rapid prototyping combined with Maze’s live feedback loop leads to intuitive, data-driven design decisions. The tone here is light but intellectually insightful – so grab a cup of coffee as we set sail into a new era of UX discovery.
Understanding Maritime Procurement UX Challenges
Designing software for maritime procurement isn’t your typical UX project. This niche of B2B SaaS comes with unique challenges that demand thoughtful solutions. Some of the hurdles UX teams face in this domain include:
Complex, Multi-Step Workflows: Maritime procurement involves a tangle of processes – from creating purchase requisitions onboard a vessel to multi-level approval onshore, to vendor bidding and compliance checks. It’s a complicated process with scattered data and tools in play. Many legacy systems force users to juggle emails, spreadsheets, and clunky interfaces, making the experience fragmented. See a detailed UX Planet case study.
Global and Varying User Base: Users range from ship officers with intermittent internet access to procurement managers in corporate offices. They have varying tech savvy. The UX must be simple and robust to accommodate all, or risk steep training curves.
High Stakes for Errors: A confusing interface can lead to ordering the wrong spare part or missing a critical deadline to stock a vessel. In an industry where delays or mistakes can cost millions, usability is not a luxury, it’s a necessity. As noted by the Nielsen Norman Group, investing in usability testing and iteration can more than double a product’s quality metrics.
Legacy Mindsets and Systems: The maritime sector has traditionally been slow to adopt new tech. UX designers often need to align diverse stakeholders – from IT to operations – on modern design changes. Gaining buy-in for a new interface requires showing tangible improvements, not just aesthetic updates.
Given these challenges, speeding up the discovery of what works and what doesn’t becomes critical. UX teams need a way to rapidly validate ideas, simplify complex workflows, and remove inefficiencies. As one procurement UX case study put it, “To make the procurement system faster we need to make it easy and simple first. Removing inefficiencies and making the process simpler will automatically reduce the time.” Read more on UX Planet.
New Tools on Deck: Rapid Interactive Prototyping
Imagine turning a design idea into a clickable, realistic prototype in a single day – without writing production code. Interactive prototyping tools like Lovable or Cursor make this possible. These emerging platforms leverage AI and collaborative editing to generate functional UI from minimal input:
Lovable
Lovable is an AI-powered platform that lets you create and deploy app-like prototypes from a single browser tab. It combines coding, deployment, and collaboration in one interface, so even non-developers can spin up a working mockup of a feature. This means a UX designer can go from a concept sketch to a semi-functional mini-app by simply describing the desired interface and logic. The AI handles the heavy lifting (layout, components, basic interactions), eliminating much of the traditional hand-off to developers in early stages.
Cursor
Cursor offers a similarly powerful environment, often described in the “vibe coding” category of tools. These tools generate real, editable code from prompts or examples, which you can then tweak. For a UX team, Cursor can quickly produce an interactive front-end that looks and behaves like the envisioned product. One designer noted that using tools like Lovable or Cursor can catch interaction details they might have missed and make it “so much easier to discuss [ideas] with dev members.” In essence, the prototype isn’t just a storyboard – it’s a working model that everyone can experience.
The key advantage here is speed. Instead of spending weeks writing custom code for a proof-of-concept, teams generate a high-fidelity prototype in hours. This prototype can be deployed with a simple URL for anyone to test-drive. For example, a UX designer could create a new “Requisition Form” interface with dynamic fields and logic in Lovable by Monday, and by Tuesday morning stakeholders worldwide are clicking through it in a browser.
Interactive prototyping also fosters better collaboration. Stakeholders no longer have to imagine how an idea might work from a static mockup – they can use it. This tangibility helps surface feedback early. Is the new spare-parts search filter intuitive? Does the approval workflow make sense to a fleet manager? It’s much easier to answer these questions when you have a realistic prototype in hand.
Navigating User Testing with Maze Analytics
Having a shiny interactive prototype is only half the battle. The real magic happens when you put that prototype in front of users and observe what they do. This is where Maze comes in. Maze is a rapid usability testing and analytics platform that turns prototype interactions into actionable insights.
With Maze, you can take the clickable prototype from Lovable or Cursor (or Figma, InVision, etc.) and create a usability test in minutes. You simply share a Maze link with users (which can be as easy as emailing to your global team or recruiting participants via Maze’s panel). Users anywhere in the world can open the prototype in their web browser and complete tasks, while Maze silently records their actions.
What makes Maze stand out is how it instantaneously translates user behavior into metrics. According to the Maze reports, test results start flowing in real time and are “instantly transformed into quantitative data, like mis-clicks and heatmaps.” In practical terms, as soon as a few users have gone through the prototype, the UX team can see visualizations of where they clicked, how they navigated, and where they struggled:
Click Heatmaps: Maze will overlay a heatmap on your prototype screens showing where users clicked (or tapped). In a maritime procurement UI, for example, you might discover that users are frequently clicking a non-interactive label or icon – a sign of misinterpretation. Maze highlights these mis-clicks clearly, so designers can identify confusing elements.
Completion Rates & Funnels: You can set tasks in Maze (e.g. “Find and order a spare part for the main engine”). Maze then tracks how many users successfully complete each task and where others drop off. If only 3 out of 5 users could complete a critical task in the prototype, that’s a red flag to address immediately. Conversely, a 100% completion with quick times is a green light for that design approach.
Time on Task and Navigation Paths: Maze reports how long users spend on each step and the paths they take. Perhaps testers on your procurement prototype took much longer than expected to locate the supplier bidding page – indicating poor discoverability. Such data helps pinpoint if a particular step or screen is a bottleneck.
User Sentiment and Feedback: Maze isn’t just quantitative. You can include survey questions or ratings after tasks. This means you get qualitative insights (“I couldn’t find the submit button” or “the terminology was confusing”) alongside the numbers. In a domain full of jargon like maritime procurement, this feedback is gold for catching domain-specific UX pitfalls.
Importantly, Maze compiles these findings into auto-generated reports that are ready to share. The platform eliminates hours of work combing through videos or notes by providing a dashboard of metrics and charts. One of Maze’s big pluses is the ability to “share your findings and start a discussion with stakeholders in your unique, auto-generated Maze Report.”
The impact on the UX discovery process is profound. By testing an interactive prototype with Maze, you get user insights in hours, not weeks. The team can literally watch the results roll in the same day a test is launched. This compresses the feedback loop dramatically. In a traditional setup, you might design for a month, implement for another, then test – only to find out about major usability issues. With Maze, by the time a developer writes the first line of production code, you’ve already identified (and fixed) the biggest UX flaws in the prototype stage.
Speed, Iteration, and Data-Backed Learning
Faster feedback naturally enables a more iterative design approach. Instead of betting on a single design and hoping it works, teams can prototype multiple ideas and test each quickly. As Jakob Nielsen emphasizes, “Iterative design is the best way to increase the quality of user experience. The more versions and interface ideas you test with users, the better,” according to the Nielsen Norman Group.
Prototype Version 1: Build a quick prototype of a new “Order Supplies” workflow using Lovable, with two competing navigation layouts (wizard-style multi-step vs. single long form). Test both with Maze on day one.
Maze Test & Learn: Maze results show that 70% of users got confused in the single-page version, whereas the wizard version had a 90% completion rate but a couple of mis-clicks on the “Next” button. This data-driven insight guides iteration.
Prototype Version 2: Improve the wizard design (larger “Next” controls), drop the single-page idea, and refine terminology based on feedback (e.g. rename “RFQ” to “Request Quote”).
Maze Test Again: Within the same week, run another Maze test. Now 100% of users complete the task, and mis-click heatmaps are clear. One minor icon confusion remains – an easy fix.
Proceed to Build (Confidently): Developers implement the design backed by evidence. The UX team has de-risked the project and established baseline metrics (e.g. “Users complete X task in under 1 minute”).
This cycle might repeat several times in days – something that would have taken months under a traditional cycle. As Yuna Akazawa, Product Designer at Braze, puts it, “Using Maze has supercharged our product design process and made it possible to drive faster turnaround times, speeding up product iteration and making for a better, faster user experience.” Read more in the Braze case study.
Aligning Stakeholders with Data-Backed Insights
Another often overlooked benefit of this approach is improved stakeholder alignment. In complex enterprise environments, you may have product owners, operations managers, IT leads, and end-user representatives. Getting them to agree on UX changes can be challenging. Interactive prototypes and Maze analytics act as a universal language that brings everyone on the same page.
Seeing is Believing: Stakeholders can click through a prototype, closing the imagination gap. Hands-on exposure often turns skeptics into advocates.
Evidence Over Opinions: Maze provides hard data (“90% success, 40% faster task time”), shifting debates from “I feel” to “the user data shows.”
Shared Language of UX: Heatmaps and session recordings create empathy. When stakeholders see where users struggle, they appreciate the value of UX investment.
Faster Buy-In for Changes: Data-backed insights make it easier to justify new workflows or AI-powered features. Concrete numbers and quotes from real users carry weight.
For example, London Computer Systems (LCS) partnered with Maze to centralize their research insights and reduce analysis time, making it easier to circulate findings internally. See the LCS case study. Similarly, Braze used Maze to validate a new multimedia messaging prototype, further cementing stakeholder support.
Case in Point: Maritime Procurement UX Makeover
The Challenge: Neptune Marine operates a fleet of cargo ships on an aging procurement platform plagued by errors and inefficiencies. Ship officers submit incorrect requests, and office managers miss critical approvals.
Approach: The UX team employed rapid prototyping and Maze testing to de-risk the redesign:
Week 1: User interviews reveal pain points: a single long “Requisition Form” and a buried approval dashboard.
Week 2: Designers build two Lovable prototypes: a streamlined wizard and a cleaned-up single page form, plus a revamped dashboard.
Week 3: Deploy prototypes in Maze to 10 users. Heatmaps show the wizard clearly outperforms the single page form, and dashboard filters are needed for “Urgency: High.”
Week 4: Iterate prototypes (bigger “Next” buttons, add urgency filter) and run a quick Maze validation. All issues clear. Stakeholders view the Maze reports and greenlight development.
Outcome: Neptune Marine launches a validated design on time, with minimal post-launch fixes. Adoption is smooth because users have effectively “pre-tested” the product. What could have been months of debate and rework was handled in weeks through rapid, data-driven iteration.
Conclusion: Charting a Course for Continuous UX Innovation
Maritime procurement software might deal with ships and supplies, but at its heart it’s about people using tools to get critical jobs done. As UX professionals in this space, our mission is to empower those people with software that is intuitive, efficient, and even enjoyable to use. The combination of interactive prototyping and Maze-driven testing is a powerful accelerant for that mission. It enables us to chart a course based on real user insights, quickly adjust our heading with each iteration, and ultimately reach a design destination that is proven to work.
By using prototyping tools like Lovable or Cursor, we lower the cost of exploration – we can try bold ideas without heavy investment. And by layering Maze’s rapid research capabilities on top, every idea is put to the test with real users. This tight feedback loop turns UX discovery into a fast-paced, evidence-based practice. Teams learn what users need and how they behave early – when there’s still time to course-correct easily.
The benefits are multifold: speed (weeks of discovery condensed into days), quality (design decisions validated by data), and alignment (stakeholders rally around clear user insights). In an industry long accustomed to inefficiency, this approach is transformative. It brings a Lean startup mentality to enterprise maritime software.
For senior UX professionals, the takeaway is clear: embrace interactive prototypes in every design discussion and back recommendations with Maze data. Cultivate a culture of continuous user testing. As Yuna Akazawa said, “Using Maze has supercharged our product design process… making for a better, faster user experience.”
In the maritime world, the winds of change are blowing toward faster, user-centered innovation. By navigating with rapid prototyping and Maze analytics, we have a modern compass guiding us toward calm waters and successful voyages.