End-to-end Mobile Application
I started by conducting primary and secondary research in order to learn everything I could about the solo travel industry and the people who travel solo. I wanted to discover their motivations and pain points, and identify any gaps in their experiences.
There are very few apps available dedicated to just solo travelers, and even less that have active users. Most of these directly competing apps either help solo travelers make social connections, like Travello, or provide travel guides and resources, like Solo.
On the other hand, there are apps that dominate the travel industry, like TripAdvisor and Hostelworld, but do not offer resources specifically to solo travelers.
Then there’s Instagram, an industry leader in social media. Although it’s not a travel product, Instagram can be used to discover travel related content.
I wanted to validate my secondary research findings with primary research, and dive deeper into user behavior and experiences.
Process: I conducted user surveys through Google Forms, with 14 multiple choice and open-ended questions, over the period of 3 days.
Recruitment: Facebook and Reddit solo travel groups
Participants: 19 participants with experience traveling solo
Research Findings:
Across my research, I uncovered patterns in the top motivators and frustrations amongst solo travelers.
How can I take user's motivations into consideration while also addressing their frustrations with solo travel? While there are ample solutions available to address the concerns of personal safety and finance, there aren’t many travel solutions to address loneliness.
This narrows down my focus and redefines the problem.
How might we make the dining experience more comfortable and enjoyable for solo travelers?
I reorganized the research findings into an empathy map to better articulate what we know, and then created a single persona to help me relate to the user throughout the design process.
Samar is a frequent solo traveler who loves to explore new places off the beaten path. It’s important for her to really immerse herself into the culture wherever she goes, and learn about local traditions, people, and food. She’s a self-proclaimed foodie who is always sharing photos of different cuisines on social media. Although she enjoys the flexibility and independence of solo travel, she wishes she had someone to share food with so she could try more things.
Mapping out Samar’s journey of discovering and interacting with the product will help uncover opportunities and potential features that will add value to her travel experience, such as verified hosts and in-depth customer feedback.
I mapped out what the app could look like, and in order to showcase the booking flow I would be creating a homepage, category page, listing page, booking page, and confirmation page.
The following wireframes shows Samar’s journey of booking a dining experience through the app. The screens start from the homepage all the way through to the booking confirmation.
Next, I give the brand some identity! I brainstormed various names and logos based on a mood board that I created to showcase the look and feel of the brand. I really wanted this brand to feel warm, inviting, and authentic. I decided to call the app 'Gather' because it is meant to bring people together, ultimately through food
My final prototype shows Samar’s reservation journey on the Gather app, from the splash screen through to the confirmation, and viewing her reservations.
I tested the Gather mobile prototype to discover how users perceive Gather as a brand, if users can navigate the app with ease, and identify any challenges.
Process: I conducted unmoderated usability tests with Maze to allow users to participate at their own convenience, with Retrospective Probing to discover intentions behind actions.
Participants: 16 participants with experience traveling solo
Insights: All participants completed 100% of the tasks, and the majority of feedback was positive. Participants said the app was organized and easy to navigate, and that the color palette complemented the app well. There were no remarkable pain points, but a couple of participants said the center-aligned text could be hard to read, the language of some buttons were confusing, and they would like to see more event information.
I created an affinity map to organize all of my usability test findings and then assessed the priority value of possible opportunities for reiteration.
Finally, I made the following revisions to the design that I considered high value and low effort.
I would reiterate upon the high value and high effort priority of including information about other attending guests. This isn’t common for booking experiences to provide, but since this is a more intimate and social experience, I can see the merit in it. There would be concerns of privacy of other attendees to address as well.
I would also be interested in giving life to other parts of the Gather app such as host profiles, and designing the app from the host’s perspective.
I was surprised to discover that my own experiences and values as a solo traveler differ from the majority of other solo travelers. It was another lesson that continues to reinforce the significance of research and challenge my assumptions and biases.
This project also taught me to see beyond my own perspective of the user. Users come in all shapes, sizes, and circumstances. For the Gather app, our users aren’t just the customers who purchase dining experiences, they’re also the hosts who use the app to promote their product.
This was the first project where I had complete autonomy from beginning to end. I decided what industry to work on, what product to create, and how to build it. It was really cool to see my idea come together throughout each process, and being able to bring it to life.
