GoGreen
Go-Green
In 2020, I decided to embark on a user-centered design journey to gain skills. I enrolled in the CareerFoundy UX Immersion program and designed an expert app that offered an experience beyond planting information.
I present my design process in the sections below, starting from defining and finding an expert app's need. The result is an app that helps beginners learn about planting and recipes through well-crafted articles and a chance to ask questions to an expert like a Gardner, landscaping designer, etc.
On a personal level, this project helped me understand how to use UX methodologies in actions and the challenges.
Background
According to Axiom, a Marketing agency in Minneapolis, gardening activity increased by 87%. in America. People during Covid times are taking advantage of connecting with nature and start garnering. As pandemic is changing our routine and the way we ask for help from experts. Virtual meetings become mainstream, and the quest for new knowledge increases. The expert app will help meet goals and support these challenging times.
Competitive Analysis
There was no direct competition that combines nutritionist, gardener, landscape designer with information on growing guides and plant-based recipes. My research applied to products from the field of sustainability, preferably with a focus on asking an expert and the target group from novice to an expert in planting.
The creation of competitive analysis in terms of marketing strategy, target market, core business, usability, layout, navigation, structure, compatibility, content, design, performance, and SWOT analysis helped assess this area's current opportunity.
The Problem
Busy and motivated users need to make simple, easy-to-follow recipes because they want to stay healthy during COVID and reduce their carbon emissions. We will know this to be true when users successfully booked an appointment with a nutritionist or gardner via video, call, or chat.
Process
The steps might differ, but a good starting point for any project is to research. Interviews helped me understand the gap that the user is facing in the market. I would not have known that there is a shortage of Gardner's experts. My app could bridge a need for a gardener's expert with information on growing guides and plant-based recipes. To further understand the market place competitive analysis was conducted. Competitive analysis isn't about S.W.O.T analysis but also looking at its UI/UX elements such as navigation, compatibility accountability devices, etc. UX field is a unique field combining science (like hypothesis, testing, and empirical data) and art (design).
Interview Goals
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Understand user’s pain points and what motivates them to change lives.
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Understand the best way to organize information on the app, so it’s less overwhelming for the readers.
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Understand the type of information and data points that are important and should be implanted in the app.
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Identify user’s interaction with an expert and what kind of experts, there are looking for regarding recipes.
All three participants were too excited about an app with all the information about growing their food and recipes. Participants were concerned about the cost, but they were willing to talk to a gardener expert rather than a nutritionist expert. Many fitness apps already have a personal trainer and a nutritionist. Gardening apps do not have an expert or recipes associated with plants. They would like to have an app that combines how-to’s, recipes, and talking to a gardener. To get to know the demographics and general sense of what people enjoy on the gardening app, I created a survey and ran it for a week.
“Omg! I want to know everything about reducing my carbon footprint. I would be more interested in talking to a gardener than a nutritionist. My dream is to own a house where I can grow my food.”
Hannah
Survey
Chosen Platform: Google Form.
Method: Promoted surveys on Instagram and Facebook groups for gardening and recipes. Shared surveys with family and friends who meet the user demographic.
Time: ran the survey for a week
Will people be willing to pay an expert?
52.6% people were willing to pay fixed pricing
Will people be willing to pay an expert?
"As a user, I want to access gardener expert via call, video, or message to feel comfortable sharing them about my planting problems."
User Story
What Did I Learn?
💡 Achieve
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My favorite part of this process was connecting with human beings!
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Letting the participants talk uncovers valuable information about the concepts of my idea.
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The interviews were conducted online, making it easier to schedule (during rona times)
💡 Challenges
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Avoiding biased, leading, vague or close-ended questions.
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Remote user interviews create unique challenges. There were many challenges in this process. For instance, some of my participants did not want to interview face-to-face to view expressions and reactions.
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I learned to pace better after each interview. It was easy to run out of time or go off-script. Learning to navigate my script but stay flexible was the key to completing a successful interview.
Building Empathy
Affinity mapping is a great way to sort and catch missed points during the interviews. It's also a fun activity to bond with your teams and knows your target users. It helps me come up with a persona that represents our audience for the product/service. A mental model is a great way to look into the depth of users' minds and emotions as they interact with the app through a scenario. It's an important step to create user flows and prototypes that make sense to the user's mental models.
Affinity Mapping
Affinity mapping is a great way to sort and catch missed points during the interviews. It's also a fun activity to bond with your teams and knows your target users. It helps me come up with a persona that represents our audience for the product/service. A mental model is a great way to look into the depth of users' minds and emotions as they interact with the app through a scenario.
Quotes from survey and participants
Quotes from survey and participants
User Personas
Collecting quantitative and qualitative data from interviews and survey results. I defined two target audience profiles, Sam (Investment Associate, 28) and Allison Smith (Graphic Designer, 37), to better empathize and prioritize my main user group according to their needs and wants.
Customer Experience Map
Before getting started with designing for Sam and Allison, I needed to craft a visual representation of how they would feel while using the Gogreen app. Task flow allowed me to identify the low and high points, in order to craft a compelling narrative in my design decisions.
The journey map helped me better understand the user and their experience through the product. The originally planned app came to light as the journey highlighted all the unfavorable, and any flaw in the steps came into the light.
What Did I Learn?
💡 Achieve
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Design decisions are easier once the target group is narrowed.
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Creating personas shows you understand your user's pains, needs, and motivations—task flow for booking an expert on gogreen expert.
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User personas give a sense of the clear picture of the user's expectations and uncover universal functions and features.
💡 Challenges
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Avoiding biased, leading, vague or close-ended questions.
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Remote user interviews create unique challenges. There were many challenges in this process. For instance, some of my participants did not want to interview face-to-face to view expressions and reactions.
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I learned to pace better after each interview. It was easy to run out of time or go off-script. Learning to navigate my script but stay flexible was the key to completing a successful interview.
Information Architecture
We used the card sorting method to determine the site map's validation from the user's perspective. Six participants were recruited using optimal workshop tools with hybrid card sort and twenty cards. Out of the three clusters, the green group has the highest agreement level of category. The 3D view gives me a good idea of how terms are connected and the list of linked cards. I decided for users to have easy access to the pages. I need to change the hierarchy of my app/website. I should have co-existing hierarchies to connect the parent and child page. Some users were having difficulty with cards as it seems most cards could be in more than one category.
Prototype
Mobile-first or website-first? That's the question. Before initial sitemap or prototyping, decided on which screen to start with. The Mobile-first approach is on the rise because it's the number one device users interact with. Mobile forces you to think about our most important features/content and present them into the device's tiny space. The initial site map was drawn and then tested through a card-sorting tool to ensure the navigational is intuitive and matches the user's mental model. The designer's mental model and biases might show up when designing. Hence it's always a good idea to test (with tools like card sorting, heat map, etc.).
Paper Prototype
With the low-fidelity paper prototype, the core features' planned path and the general application can be easily adjusted and tested out. Without much effort, adjustments can be easily made, saving money from costly bad navigation later on
Clickable Prototype
Ideating prototypes from low to mid-high with figma helped me understand what features are important and feasible. If I were in a team, I would have open communication and collaboration with developers, managers, and any relevant team members. Invite them to check out the prototype and gather their feedback to see if I miss any business requirements or breached any constraints. This is an excellent chance to know which features are feasible for developers to work on. I can go back and ideate before it's ready for the user's perspective.
*Business goals, constraints, and requirements are as important as the user perspective. Should be given equal weight to both.
What Did I Learn?
💡 Achieve
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Less is more when it comes to the reduction of pages and to speed up the process.
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Learning the difference between native vs. website app.
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Mobile-First design is the best approach for this case.
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Functionality vs. Uniqueness. Understanding and choosing which features should be tested.
💡 Challenges
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The balance between many pages vs. many features.
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Which/how many features can be combined on a page?
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Keeping the app unique, at the same time simple and intuitive.
Usability Testing
For the app, we conducted usability testing since it is easy and less expensive than other testing methods. The test is a great way to glean and learn about our target audience and their mental models. Before conducting any tests, ensure the script, test objective, and plan are well defined and documented. The document gives transparency to the participants and internal teams on what is being tested and how. When done right, we can quantify the reactions and feedback about our prototype. The methods used to quantify could be through heat map, eye movements, rainbow spreadsheet, etc.
Testing
Test Objective:
− Is the onboarding easy to understand with clear and concise instructions?
− Assess certain intuitive features for users to interact with, booking an expert, search & filter for plants/recipes blogs.
− Assess user’s emotions with the app’s layout and features within the mobile application.
Methodology
Moderated in-Person and moderated remote testing methods will be used.
Moderated in-person will be limited to the family due to COVID safety and regulations in place.
Preparation
There was a total of 6 participants. Three of them were in-person and the other three were remote. All the participants were related to the personas except one who participated in the control testing session. Their responses were then processes using affinity mapping and a rainbow spreadsheet. It contributed to summing the qualitative results and insights into the severity of the errors.
What Did I Learn?
💡 Achieve
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By making a layout with your plan and script, you are relaxed and tests can go faster.
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Reviewing and sorting your results helps you detect patterns that you might have missed.
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Usability Tests are great for identifying any bottlenecks in the process.
💡 Challenges
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Finding participants takes a lot of time.
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Language can be a barrier if you working with international crowds.
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Upgrades take a lot of time.
UI Element
Much of the feedback that we have gotten was about the visual element of the app. Our iteration's next focus was on how we present our content and look appealing to the users. Design principle or Gestalt law and HIG guidelines were followed for MVP to look professional and clean. Documenting our process along the is a good practice for the future of the brand. The design system (include design file, codebase, and documentation hub) is a universal living, breathing document for the company. They are great resources to stay consistent and show professionalism in the industry. Psychology, marketing, and design go hand-in-hand when creating a marketing strategy for the users after the product is ready. In addition to the style guide, the most important aspect is copy/language and accessibility.
Style Guide
What Did I Learn?
💡 Achieve
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A deeper understanding of psychology principles of design.
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Learned to make decisions beyond usability testing.
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GoGreen represent organic and sustainability which is represented by the color green
💡 Challenges
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A style guide takes a lot of time and it's an ongoing project.
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Coming up with a combination in terms of color and typography
Reflection
As a possible future action, we suggest future development based on another round of testing. Invite developers and have an open communication/collaboration for the next steps. If approved, we would work and support the team to ensure the product comes to life. We would keep in mind the accessibility principles and transparency about our process to ensure we do not violate our user's privacy. In the next phase, adding a badge system for people to track their carbon emissions would be valuable to track their footprint would be a good idea.
🎉 This was a great experience for me as it gave me the foundation and the meaning for a UX role within an agile process.
🎉 Due to my analyst role previously, I had an idea of UX Design, but I have managed to get a better understanding of the process and the methodology used with this course.
🎉 The research, site maps, and personas are some of my favorite parts and the part that defines the whole design process.
🎉 Rapid testing is a must, but so is testing the process.
🎉 Criticism is a great way to improve and learn.
