OVERVIEW
Summary
Dirty Pawz Mobile Grooming is a pet grooming service app that brings the pet grooming services to pet parents to make their lives easier, and offers a personal grooming experience in a calm and safe environment for pets.
My Roles and Responsibilities
UX Designer, Researcher, Content Developer, UI Designer, Visual Designer
Deliverables
User Research, User Personas, User Stories, User Flows, Wireframes, Sketches Usability Testing, Hi-Fidelity Prototypes
Tools
Figma and InVision
Team
UX Design mentor - Polly Lee
Timeline
3-week design sprint
Problem
A local pet groomer has seen and heard it all from pet parents who are frustrated with grooming services at pet salons, their pets are being traumatized, kept in cages too long, and handled in an unloving way. She wants to solve this problem with a mobile grooming business for pet parents and their pets to give them a better pet grooming experience.
Target Audience
Pet parents, between the ages of 35-44 years old, with additional income to spend on their pets, and pet parents who handle all of the pet grooming needs in the family.
PROCESS
Discovery and Research
In this 3-week design sprint, I planned and conducted user interviews with 5 pet parents, and I created a survey with 25 pet parents to better understand the pet grooming services from the pet parents perspective.
Based on the insights gained from the user interviews and the survey, 2 key findings emerged which informed my design decisions going forward as I designed the mobile grooming app.
Key Findings
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Create an app where pet parents can locate this grooming business using their location.
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Create a screen within the app where pet parents can select grooming services and schedule an appointment that would be convenient to them.
User Survey Results
40%
Pet parents chose grooming services based on location
52%
Use big box pet salons (Pet Smart, PetCo, etc.)
44%
Get their pets groomed every 2-3 weeks
User Interview Results
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Location fields were straightforward, participants were able to find a mobile groomer in their area.
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During the interviews 3 pet parents stated, "they would try a mobile groomer, if they knew about it and it was in their area."
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Pet parents found the information needed to schedule an appointment.
Persona
Based on the initial interviews with my client about the type of users she envisions using the app, I created 2 personas for pet parents Kari and Jodi to take a deeper dive into their frustrations with pet grooming services.
INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE
Ideation
To address my clients' vision and the pet parents' pain points, I conducted a "How Might We" exercise to help formulate some ideas to later determine the best solution to the problem.
Sketching
"How Might We"
Create a way for pet parents to locate this grooming business.
"How Might We"
Create a selection of grooming services.
"How Might We"
Create a schedule to book grooming appointments.
For this phase of the process, I used pen and paper to sketch some ideas using the
Crazy 8's method which challenged me to quickly visualize ideas to solve Kari's problem.
User Flow
In an effort to understand the objectives of the pet parents, I created a user flow based on the possible user stories. The user flow demonstrates the step-by-step process Kari will take to accomplish her goals.
User Stories
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As a pet parent, I need a pet grooming service in my area that is convenient and stress-free.
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As a pet parent, I want a local groomer who offers the same services as pet salons.
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As a pet parent, I want a local groomer who will come to my house to groom my pets.
Paper Prototype
I created a paper prototype to play around with the flow of the screens to decide which screen would get Kari quicker to the goal of making a grooming appointment for Bella.
Storyboard
I created a storyboard to visualize the different steps Kari would take while using the mobile app to schedule Bella a grooming appointment.
Choose a Solution
After the Crazy 8's and the storyboarding exercises, it was time to decide on the best solution to solve Kari's problem with the pet grooming services. I narrowed down my ideas to this idea which combines the location, grooming services, and schedule an appointment all on one screen.
Moodboard
Digital Wireframe
After the user flows, I created low-fidelity wireframes in Figma for this mobile grooming app based on the user research and survey which gave me an idea of what I needed to include in the design for this mobile grooming app to address the pet parents problem.
Usability Testing
I conducted user testing with 3 pet parents in person for 20 minutes. The pet parents were given a task-based scenario using the low-fidelity prototype. Feedback gained from the users showed the problem areas in each screen and what I needed to improve upon.
Task-based scenario performed with 3 pet parents during usability testing needed to determine the ease of use for the following app features:
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Find a mobile grooming service in the users location.
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Select services offered by the mobile groomer.
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Schedule an appointment with the mobile groomer.
User Interview Results
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Location fields were straightforward, participants were able to find a mobile groomer in their area.
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During the interviews 3 pet parents stated, "they would try a mobile groomer, if they knew about it and it was in their area."
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Pet parents found the information needed to schedule an appointment.
Next Steps
Based on what I learned during the user interviews, I propose the following next steps in future iterations of this project.
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On the "pet selection services" screen pet parents wanted more services and pricing info.
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Create a screen for pet parents to purchase the mobile services from the app.
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Conduct more testing on the additional features of the app.
PROTOTYPE
FINAL THOUGHTS
Conclusion
In search for a solution for my client, I was challenged with staying on track as I moved through the design sprint process, and keeping the scope of the project narrow. My client wanted to add more features to the app than what I could do within the timeframe.
Lessons Learned
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Sketching ideas for the client helps you and the client get on the same page and it's easier to change things on paper.
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I was able to create a clickable prototype for my client to bring her vision for a mobile grooming business to life.
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The valuable feedback that I received from the pet parents during testing helped in my decisions on the layout of certain screens on the app.