Opatter

B'cos opinions matter

Re-designing the In-Store shopping experience

From Idea Pitch to MVP.

Role

UI/UX Designer

My Activities

User Research, Ideation, Prototyping, UI/UX and User Testing

Target Users

Gen Z (11-26) & Millennials( 27-42)

Team Size

1 UX, 1 BA, 1 VD

Timeline

June-July 2018

Tools

Adode XD, Photoshop, Illustrator, Miro Board,

MS Teams

What problem do we want to solve?

With the abundance of products in the market there are so many options to choose from. Now the average consumer is confused in making a satisfied buying decision. Many times consumers get a choking sensations and confusions in selecting what they actually came to purchase. Resulting scenario is people often end up spending more on unwanted or half satisfied products or leaving without any of the products they came to purchase. We are looking for a solution to make this experience much easier for cosumers.

How can the app solve the problem?

The objective of this app is to make the experience of purchasing something personal or a gift for someone as easy and simple as possible. The aim is even if you are 16 or 60 years old, using this proposed app should help you to make a satisfied decision making when doing a purchase. Researches have found that customer are much relaxed and if there are shopping along with your close friend(s) or with somebody who best knows their likes and dislikes.

Envisioning a mobile app which can be used to get instant responses from your friends or close ones anytime you go for shopping for a better shopping experience and satisfaction.

In what way does the app stand out from existing solutions?

The logic of this app is that , the app lets you make a decision on any problem by taking the collective inputs from 5 for your most closest friends form your social circle or whatsapp list. It is like you can ask your close friends about anything and if more than three approves , it means its best for you and just go ahead and vice versa.

What is the product’s value proposition?

Bearing in mind that people buy value propositions and satisfaction, not products and apps, we stated that our product’s value proposition would be saving time and money with a satisfaction and confidence that they can only experience in their closest friendship group.

Design Process

From the interview insights, I was able to get a better sense of the users expectation. With this research, I crafted a persona in order to drive my designs for the target users.

Discovery

In this phase we get to know each other and conduct in-depth research.We identify the business problems, its objectives and what makes your brand unique. We also study the market, analyze competition and figure out users' needs and pain points.

Research

Friendship matters and staying connected with them always keeps you relaxed in all walks of life. The aim is to provide a platform that focuses more on our closest friends rather a large network which social media currently promotes in making decisions wherever you need their opinion irrespective of their location.

On an average a person has-

200 Social Media Friends

05 Close Bonded Relationships

02 With whom they share most private details

From HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW

Other Findings

88% people use their smartphones while doing instore shopping
There are 4.8 billion social media users worldwide, representing 59.9% of the global population and 92.7% of all internet users.
Across all age groups, social media users cite “friends & family” as their primary reason for using social media.
79% makes a purchasing decisions based on suggestions from Friends and Family.

User Interviews

Goals & Objective

To find out the motivations and pain points of how millennials currently connect with people closest to them. Also discuss how they prioritize and maintain their current social relationships.

Interviews (30–40mins long) were conducted in person or over the telephone.

Participant Criteria

Gen Z and Millennials (ages 11–46) who are currently focused on building their full-time career, have experienced disconnect with their friends, value social relationships, tech-savvy, and uses some form of social platform to connect with friends.

Findings

Millennials are focused on careers. They will make the effort to look for activities to do with their friends when they have enough time and energy.
Gen Z try to stay connected by doing activities they enjoy with their friends. Face-to-face interaction is most important, but connecting through messages with things they are interested in is a good way to bridge the gap when time is limited.
With busy schedules, reminders are needed to reach out to a friend. Millennials are more likely to connect with a friend if they are reminded, whether that is through someone posting on social media, or seeing a past photo.
Millennials value their existing relationships more and want to nurture that connection.
There is an overall feeling of loneliness when Millennials are too focused on their career.
The longer they go without talking to their friends the harder it is to reconnect without an icebreaker.

Weightage of Opinions from close friends over Reviews & Rating

Study shows that, the volume of friend reviews had much stronger impact on the target user’s decision making behaviour than that of the crowd. The valence and variance of the crowd reviews showed no influence when ignoring the friend reviews, but negative influence when considering it. Despite the common perception that the volume, valence and variance of reviews significantly impact the likelihood of following behaviour, we found that such influence comes from friend reviews.

Courtsey- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1567422318300103

Primary concerns highlighted by both user group

Out of the many, two of the most common concerns were selected to proceed ahead.

Selecting something for someone is always difficult!!

Heck! Selecting something for yourself is difficult!!!!

Strategy

This is the phase we worked on setting up correct goals, determine product features and estimate the scope of work that will provide an optimal business impact. We conducted thorough Brainstorming, user research, including developing personas, user stories, an empathy map, and a user journey map.

Defining Persona

Synthesising the data from the interviews, research and identifying the pain points / opportunities i was able to define a behavioural user persona and their pain points. This exercise helps in deriving a direction to what the intention and core needs of the design solution should be.From the interview insights, I was able to get a better sense of the users expectation.

Making a purchase decision can be tough for John

Based on research, created an empathy map listing a set of the main concerns or confusions that John is having, when he is making a purchase decision.

Customer Journey Mapping

With the results of the interviews and looking at Johns pain points an experience journey map was created to see which moments I can focus my digital intervention.

The Opatter Logic

Before Opatter

Even though John has lot of friends, he is confused many times when it comes to making a decision as most of his friends are not around.

After Opatter

Through Opatter , John is now able to get quick opinion on any problem from his most trusted friends even if they are not around. This support is making John more relaxed and helps him in making wise decisions.

Defining Task flow

Constructed a task flow, outlining the most efficient steps for users to accomplish specific tasks.

Design

Finally, we are ready to move onto design. Leveraging research data and project objectives, we build the most comforting, engaging and desirable experience for users, helping them achieve their goals as quickly as possible with minimum fuss.

Wireframe Exploration

I started working on a few key screens in low-fidelity to find the best solution in terms of usability and scalability. After testing and refining, the overall layout started to shape into the unified structure that can be applied for different types of users and their use cases.

Branding Guidlines

As the streamlined and integrated flow became more and more clear, I began sketching wireframes of the new solution. The purpose of the low fidelity sketches was mainly to ensure hierarchy, design goals, and make sure that I was using the proper components for each function.

Final Outcome and Interactions

Splash and Log in interactions

The Splash Screen was designed with a lot of Question Marks circling in the background. The thought behind this was that the users are confused of many in their day to day life.

The Sign in can be done using any of the social networking sites

Selection of most dearest friends

Opatter access users friends circle from all social media using the users credentials and displays details of the most 20 friends the user have been interacting the most.

Five of the most dearest friends are added by the user for getting instant opinions as these are the users's most trusted friends

Making a Purchasing decision

Uses camera and grabs the item in the defined focus area to select for sharing with friends.

User can edit the default text and set the response time by adjusting the slider and forward the image/video to his friends for opinion.

Requesting for opinion from friends

Alternate way of requesting opinion from friends is to drag down the image using thumb and the image stretches like a rubber band setting the response time and once user releases the thumb the image is send to his friends for opinion.

What friends see in their social media wall

Friends receive the posting from John on their wall where they can click on either the 'Awesome' or 'Meh' button as response.

Instant decisions from friends

If majority friends clicks 'Awesome', then user can go ahead with the purchasing decision.

If majority friends clicks 'Meh', then user can back out from the purchasing decision.

Conclusion

By considering user needs, requirements, and best practices, the idea pitch app created a seamless onboarding experience that instilled trust and confidence in new users. The iterative design process, informed by user research and analysis, resulted in a user-friendly interface and clear communication of the app’s benefits and functionalities.

Key Learnings

Looking at the work I accomplished during these 8 weeks, there were plenty of highs and lows. My biggest takeaway from the process of human-centered design is to let the users inform the design. If the design doesn’t improve user experience or meet a goal, then the design is just decorative. It is important to keep testing and keep iterating. And through this process, remember that as a designer, you are not your designs. I needed to keep an open mind during user testing and feedback, as there will always be hard moments which can lead to pivotal changes.

Asking the right questions

I realised after conducting a few initial interviews that asking directed but open questions is important to validating my hypothesis. Without this, interviews end up with vague answers on irrelevant topics which do not answer my assumptions.

Testing is a continuous process

Yes, you heard it right, testing process does not end after the user testing phase. As a designer, I am constantly balancing what is best for the user and other constraints, such as time and resource. When possible, continue testing because it will always lead to a better product.

Thank you for reading!

And following along on my journey to becoming a UX designer.