Spontanea - Travel App
Prompt: Imagine you've just been hired as a product designer for a new travel startup. The startup plans to launch the app once the global Pandemic ends. The startup’s goal is to build a modern-day mobile app that helps people plan their next trip, post-Pandemic.
The Problem:
When traveling, it is often fun to play things by ear and see where the day takes you. However, without a local guide or extensive research, it can be hard to know where cool attractions are or how to get to them.
The Solution:
An app that connects users to local places based on their location. Spontanea can be used while traveling or at home to create some adventure while you travel.
Solo project - 4 weeks
Methods practiced: User research, Definition & Ideation, Prototyping, Testing
Deliverables created: Proto persona/User persona, User interviews, competitor analysis, affinity diagram, empathy map, user insight statement, problem statement, brainstorming, feature prioritization matrix, value proposition canvas, user scenario, storyboard, user journey map, user flow, paper prototype, digital wireframe, user testing, final clickable prototype
I created a proto-persona to help guide me in creating questions for my user interviews. Once I completed, I realized that my initial thoughts were off-base, the user would be the kind of person that would visit social events and link up with friends.
Users who travel to escape the city have wants and needs that were so opposite to what Spontanea was trying to accomplish that it was clear that Spontanea's user base would be narrowed down to those who are interested in traveling around cities.
I created the user persona of Kayan based on the interviews I conducted after aggregating the data through an empathy map and affinity diagram.
After narrowing down the user base, it was important to understand exactly what problems our users would be facing and how Spontanea could solve them.
Spontanea's users are spontaneous travellers who are interested in finding locations nearby where they currently are.
The user journey map illustrates the benefit that Kayan would receive from using Spontanea, as well as addresses opportunities for Spontanea to improve Kayan's experience.
Using competitive analysis allowed me to understand what competitor applications did well and what they were lacking. I noticed while the apps I surveyed collectively checked all the boxes, no single app did it alone.
I created a user flow which helped to sketch out a paper prototype.
Users had suggestions to improve the readability: not using tabs to denote different transportation types. Users were not certain about how Spontanea was unique from the other travel apps on the market.
Major take-aways from this project: user base would be traveling close-by, app is best-suited to cities, users are confused at why this app is unique, users like traveling with or meeting up with friends, users like the familiar design language