ON MY WAY

UX DESIGN . COMPARATIVE RESEARCH . AGILE DESIGN RESEARCH METHODS
3 WEEK TEAM PROJECT . 2024
CLIENT : VICTOIRE MANDONNAUD

Final screens

2024

Project overview

Client-Driven Brief: Worked collaboratively with three colleagues on a brief for the app "On My Way."
App Concept: "On My Way" connects like-minded individuals to meet in an organized manner, promoting real-world connections.
Problem Statement: Highlights excessive time spent on phones, aiming to turn this issue into a positive change.
App Purpose: Focuses on fostering real-world human connections while aligning with the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the United Nations.
Platform Features: Designed to create meaningful and sustainable interactions among users.

Meeting our client

We identified the "Communities" feature as the key priority for our client. Still in its early concept phase, this hub would allow users to connect, interact, and join communities aligned with their interests and the SDGs they support.

To build trust and confidence, we fostered a casual, open dialogue with our client. This helped us understand their preferences and align them with our app design goals.

Key Priority Identified: Focused on developing the "Communities" feature as requested by the client.

Feature Concept: A hub for users to connect, interact, and join interest-based communities aligned with the SDGs.
Client Collaboration: Created a comfortable, open space for conversation to build trust and confidence.
Outcome: Gained insights into the client’s preferences to better align with the app design.

Competitive research

Since this project involves tackling an innovative app concept, we were unable to find direct competitors to study and analyze. Instead, we focused on identifying apps with visual aesthetics that resonated with our team’s vision for the redesign. By gathering strong visual references, we aimed to compare these inspirations with our current design and align them with the goals we’ve set for the updated app experience.

Two apps stood out as relevant examples: Strava and Meetup. Strava embodies the spirit of fostering real-world engagement through digital tools, while Meetup balances its emphasis on encouraging in-person connections with a clean and appealing interface. These served as useful benchmarks as we sought to refine our app's design.

Heuristic evaluation

The heuristic evaluation of the current state of the app revealed significant areas for improvement. While the app demonstrates a functional foundation, the analysis identified multiple issues that hinder usability, user satisfaction, and overall performance. The evaluation highlighted critical shortcomings in areas such as navigation, consistency, feedback, accessibility, and visual design. These gaps collectively impact the user experience, signalling a need for substantial refinements and optimizations.

Low usability : The apps lack of any design system made its usability near impossible, it felt similar to an early stage wireframe than a finished design .
No design system : The app lacked a consistent visual identity. Fonts, icons and call to action buttons, there was far too much negative space which made it overall harder to navigate .
Language : Limited or unclear feedback for user actions (e.g., button presses or form submissions) leaves users unsure about the success of their interactions.

Interviews

During the interview process, we had access to a diverse pool of potential participants, provided by our client. This included individuals who were either familiar with the app or actively involved in activities aligned with the app’s objectives. Many of these participants were part of the international community called the Global Shapers—a network of change-makers spanning more than 500 local hubs worldwide

Interview key findings

Diverse Participant Pool: Participants were drawn from a client-provided list, including users familiar with the app and individuals engaged in related activities.
Global Shapers Community: Many participants were members of this international network of active change-makers, providing a unique and relevant perspective.
Interview Reach: A total of 9 individuals were interviewed across 6 countries, offering a broad range of insights.
Age Alignment: The average age of participants was kept at 27, reflecting the app’s target demographic of users under 30.

Female, 28, RNLI 'I want to be involved and inspired by others'

Female, 28, RNLI 'It is important to me to continuously learn new things and keep up with the world'

Male, 26, Software 'I seek out knowledge from people I trust'

User Persona

Problem statement

“Celine stays informed by following trusted thought leaders across multiple channels, including newsletters, social media, podcasts, and book recommendations.

She wants to streamline her research process and cut down the time spent staying informed, so she can focus more on expanding her social network.
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Visual development

Creating the mood board and visual cues was a process I felt confident in, drawing on my artistic experience. I thoroughly enjoyed this familiar approach, where the team collaborated to shape the project’s visual direction through shared imagery. I encouraged sourcing inspiration from diverse places to reflect the key themes we identified, allowing creativity to flow from all kinds of visual references.

confident Use of Artistic Skills: Applied years of artistic experience to confidently create mood boards and visual cues.
Enjoyable and Familiar Process: Found the process highly enjoyable and aligned with my creative strengths.
Collaborative Group Effort: Facilitated teamwork, allowing the group to exchange ideas and visualize a shared direction through curated images.
Encouraged Diverse Inspiration: Promoted sourcing images from a wide variety of places to capture the essence of key descriptive words.
Shaping the Visual Path: The mood board helped solidify the visual and creative direction for the project.

Product development

Wire Framing

Designing the prototype required a highly collaborative and structured approach. We began by creating a low-fidelity structure as a group, using basic shapes to map out screens and allowing quick edits and adjustments. Once we agreed on the layout, we divided the task of developing the screens into mid-fidelity among team members.

The process was smooth, guided by reference images and screen collages we had prepared. Each member completed their assigned screens, and we worked together to support each other as needed.

We successfully developed two key features: onboarding and the event-joining aspect of the communities page. However, despite our progress, we felt something was still missing…

Usability testing

Usability Testing Results: Achieved an average SUS score of 78.75% during mid-fidelity testing.

Key Feedback Areas:
- Adjust text sizing for better readability.
- Improve spacing between certain elements for clarity.
- Reduce or refine the amount of information displayed on pages.
- Layout of the feed page was causing some confusion
- Calendar feature would be essential for being reminded of event sign ups
Usability test objectives:
- How well is the apps flow performing
- Improve spacing between certain elements for clarity.
- Reduce or refine the amount of information displayed on pages.
- Layout of the feed page was causing some confusion
- Calendar feature would be essential for being reminded of event sign ups

Changes made

Streamlined the onboarding flow to reduce friction and improve user engagement.
Redesigned the feed layout for a cleaner, more organized presentation of content.
Refined navigation labels and icons to clearly differentiate between Groups and People

Final Prototype

Dark mode