city trip Travel App case study.
- Role: (User research, interaction design, visual design, Prototype).
- Project Type: design concept.
- Length of Project: 4 weeks.
overview
I came up with an idea for this app after watched many people on YouTube love to explore new places. Here is what I found, travelers are always facing different challenges, especially those who used to travel using their cars also those who visit a new city for the first time. All of them are looking for reliable services such as hotels, car services, restaurants, more. Besides, they could share their trip experience to help others to get more information about the place they will visit.
challenge
Create a car service trip app that will improve the traveler’s engagement to make their trip useful.
Process
research
Through the research phase, I determined the stressful time the user is facing while planning for a new trip using his car. Besides, their expectations about the quality of services they will get during this trip with their family or friends. Also, what type of situations they should take into consideration. So, I defined the target user's frustrations and goals to help them make the right decisions and enjoy their trip.
Business Goals
- Define the critical features the travelers wants the most.
- Identify the main challenges travelers are facing.
- Define how travelers interact with new places and services.
- How to increase user satisfying?
- What are the factors to increase trustful services in this app?
User reviews
In the first place, I decided to take another direction. So, before looking for what is the best apps or services people rely on in the trip, I treated myself as one of them by reading travel blogs to get the same perspective by making my plan trip, epically I have never traveled before. For this reason, I needed to know the behavior behind actions people take to planning their trip. What are the main factors that affect the decisions they make? What is the vital thing they need to take care of during the road trip?
After I got an insight into the product and the strategy they rely on it, I started to collect user feedback from apps they utilize on Google Play, which helped me to a defined user pain point.
User journey map
Next, using the user pain point, I created a user journey map to help me imagine how the user plans a new car trip, from starts collecting all resources they need to arrive at their destination. Aim to reduce all stressful times they will encounter on the road.
Affinity Mapping:
Then, I started the HMW question to dive deeper to generate new ideas. After that, I created affinity mapping to organize all features under each category to prioritize factors that affect user decisions to plan a specific trip without any stress.
Wireframe & usability testing
I began this phase by collecting ideas and images from similar apps to get inspiration about the features that serve user goals. Besides, I used the previous high-fidelity mockup I had designed last time to know how the new features will work. After that, I followed crazy’s 8 wireframe approach to get new ideas as fast as possible.
Next, I asked my brother to test the previous prototype I had done before with new wireframes to imagine how these new features will be working in real life and if it is easy to use, the main idea from this approach is to get fresh insight. After 30 min during the session, I took some notes, and after I iterated this phase one more time, I decided to move to the next step.
High-Fidelity Design
Then, I added new extra features screens. Next, I asked my brother one more time to observe any details that need to change. Finally, everything works fine until this time.
user flow
Next, I created a user flow to know how the users will interacting with new features and how many steps they will take to achieve their goal.
Visual Design
I have created a mood board based on sundown and sunrise to represent calm, positivity, excitement, trust, and peace. Besides, I want my design to be easy to use. So, I have adopted a minimalist, clean, modern in my design language.
And all of that based on asking myself the next question first:
- What is the message I want the user to understand from my design?
- What kind of emotion and feeling do I want to bring to the user?
- How to create a remarkable design?
high-fidelity prototype:
After I decided what is the language of the visual style I want. Next, I moved forward to create a high-fidelity prototype using Adobe XD.
solution
Create a car trip app service that allows travelers to plan their trip in the best way possible starts from services they need like car services, hotels, restaurants in places they want to visit, all of that upon other traveler experiences. And that will make car trips desirable and fun.
Conclusion
When I started this project, I was straggle with the research phase. So, I decided to give the design sprint a chance to see the result I can get out of it. For instance, I loved crazy's 8 wireframes to generate different layout ideas. Besides, using Affinity Mapping and User Journey Map help me to understand the target user. Also, using usability testing after every wireframe step makes my process faster than I expected. Besides, my technical background helped me to know which technology will be a good fit to solve the problem.
Eventually, if there more time, I would find a target user to build a strong persona to go farther on the user pain point. Also, to run a cart sorting session to gather more ideas, And this is the first thing I will do the next time, especially, I want to spend more effort and time to serve business goals much better.