Projects
Doxn- Mobile App
CASE STUDY
THE PROBLEM
THE SOLUTION
MY ROLE
While a pet’s health and wellness is a top priority, pet owners tend to rely on their memory for storing crucial information about their health products, specifically when a medication or supplement needs to be refilled- this can lead to the unfortunate situation of forgetting an important date or dose.
Through surveying, interviewing and user testing, I determined the type of product and features that pet owners needed most to keep their pet’s health product information organized. A full implementation followed, resulting in a testable,
high-fidelity prototype.
This was a solo project- I executed all research, design, and prototyping.
GOALS
Pet owners lead busy lives and need a solution that will seamlessly fit into their everyday routine. The solution needs to:
- Simply organize their pet’s health product information
- Have information be easy to access and edit
- Have an inviting design that is sophisticated and intuitive
RESEARCH
LISTEN + LEARN
I studied quantitative data to better understand the average pet owner’s experience- statistics that involved pet ownership, pet spending habits, and veterinary trends. I kept my survey and interview questions on the outskirts of my problem space, focusing on conversing and empathizing with my users, seeing the problem space from their perspective.
Seven pet owners were interviewed for this project, recruited from my survey respondants. The interviewees were all from various locations around Canada and the USA, and while the majority of pet owners had dogs, two had several cats, and there were even a few pigs! Focusing more on discussing their relationships and daily routines with their pets allowed me to gain a deeper understanding of their wants, needs and habits within my problem space.
SYNTHESIZING
UNDERSTANDING THE USER
My interviews taught me an important point about the habits of my potential user- they used either digital or hardcopy agendas/calendars to keep their own personal appointments and information organized, and yet they relied on their memory to keep their pet’s health products and appointments organized.
Creating affinity maps and empathy maps from the data collected in my primary and secondary research led to the assigning of two user personas: one of a pet owner, and one of a pet service provider. My original concept was to have a ‘personal’ and ‘professional’ version, with the professional version being more of a database for numerous pets and their needs. Although this was not exactly the route I ended up taking, creating this persona allowed me to think of the project from a secondary point of view, and analyze the features that I hoped to include in a different light.
IDEATION
GIVE THE PEOPLE WHAT THEY WANT
The information extracted from my research pointed to the type of product that my users needed- an app to collect and organize their pet’s health and wellness information, with some sort of reminder or calendar feature. A preliminary site map and user flows were created in Miro after brainstorming a collection of ‘How might we…’ statements, following three established red routes: creating a user profile, creating a pet profile, and adding a supplement or medication.
How might we simplify the organization of pet information?
How might we prevent pet owners from running out of their pet’s daily medication and/or supplements?
How might we provide a solution for pet owners’ record keeping?
GOING WITH THE FLOW
Now, I was starting to have an idea of how my users would move through these tasks. Already, I was able to reassess my original red routes. I decided to scrap the task of the user creating a profile- as this app was primarily for personal use, a user profile with their own information was not necessary. I redefined my red routes as: onboarding, creating a basic pet profile, adding medications and supplements, and adding vet information.
I started laying out the red route screens on graph paper, and finished with a series of user tests with a clickable prototype uploaded to Marvel. These sketches and feedback gathered from my testing sessions formed the base for the first digital step in my design- wireframing.
DESIGN
NOW...MAKE IT PRETTY!
I built the wireframes for my red routes in Sketch. Although the hand-drawn sketches were my first opportunity to start making my idea come to life, moving to a digital format where I could start to conceptualize design elements really tapped into an excitement and passion for my product.
I arranged my wireframes into a wireflow of the full app, with red routes indicated by different colours, using Overflow. From this exercise, I now had a firm idea of the design elements that my final product needed to include, and the number and type of screens that a user would expect to see when navigating through the app. I started to explore colour palettes and imagery that would inspire the feelings that users felt when they were with their pets; happy, calm, playful, adventurous, and love.
The name of the app is one area that I did allow my personal experience to weigh in. ‘Doxn’ is the phonetic pronunciation of the dog breed, Dachshund- we share our home with two ‘little wieners’, and they are a huge part of our life. When I found the Arista 2.0 typeface, with its curved lines and bubble-like appearance, I knew it was a style that I could modify into a successful and memorable wordmark that could be both playful and sophisticated.
The brightness of the orange-blush values in contrast with the calming blue palette I selected for Doxn felt happy and cheerful, yet also grounded and calming- a contrast of emotions that is all too familiar to the average pet owner.
Doxn’s HiFi sketches were built in Sketch. Slowly, placeholders from my wireframes were filled with content, and the project really started to take shape. I included the option for users to attach a refill reminder when adding a supplement or medication to their profile. After I finished mock-ups of my red routes using my HiFi designs, I began building the first version of my final prototype in InVision Studio. When I had nearly finished my prototype, I experienced what would normally be considered a ‘good problem’- my prototype was...too intuitive. I had built out some beautiful screen layovers and modals that held the first-time user’s hand through the entire setting up process.
However, I realized that this was not really testable. I revisited my red routes and modified my original plan by having my participants act as if they were a returning user (Login), to change their pet’s profile picture, to add a new pet, and to add a new reminder.
Although I felt a little like I could have used my time more wisely had I thought of this before building out all of the screens for the original red routes, a positive takeaway was that I would have a prototype that was closer to being fully usable, as more features would be activated. Minor changes were made based on the feedback collected from my first round of user testing the HiFi prototype, and after completing my final round of user tests without any notable navigation issues, I could sit back, relax, and admire my hard work.
TESTING
YOU LEARN SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY
Throughout the project build, I conducted three different usability tests. In the first test session, five users navigated through my red routes, using the hand-drawn sketch prototype in Marvel. I was surprised to see several of my participants stumble at some points- after working on this project for weeks up to this point, I was so familiar and confident with my navigation! I made notes and reflected the changes in my wireframes.
My next experience with usability testing came later in the build with the first session of five new users exploring my redefined red routes in the HiFi prototype, designed in Sketch and built in InVision Studio. Here, users navigated the tasks with minimal issues and feedback, the most prominent revolving around the clarity of the ‘add photo’ button, the ease of switching between pet profiles, and the need to include more custom options when adding a new reminder.
For my final round of testing, another five participants were recruited to test the improved, final working draft of my prototype. With no notable navigational issues picked out from the session, I closed the door on my usability testing, completing another chapter of Doxn’s young life.
The ‘+’ icon was swapped with a universal image icon to add or change the profile picture
An option to add a recurring reminder was added to the 'Add a New Reminder' screen
A toggle action was added when the user taps the profile picture icon on the bottom toolbar, allowing easy switching between profiles
CHALLENGES
LOOKING BACK...
One function that I was hoping to include was an information sharing function, allowing pet owners to share selected information with their pet service provider (dog walker, pet sitter, boarding facility, etc.), eliminating the need to leave hand-written notes or relay important information verbally. However, when I started to map out the product, this function didn’t really seem to fit in with what I had decided was the primary function of the app- to be a refill reminder calendar-based app for a pet’s health and wellness products. Although I am happy with the direction that my final product took, this is a function that I continue to think is important to the app- in hindsight I feel that it would have been beneficial to include it in the final build.
SUMMARY
WHAT A RIDE!
Being my first experience with focused UX research and UI design, Doxn pulled me in many unexpected directions that, at times, were completely overwhelming. I learned the value of taking space from a project and coming back with a set of fresh eyes. One of the most difficult challenges occurred in the planning stages- not letting my personal bias interfere with what my test users and collected data uncovered. I thought that being a pet owner would give me an advantage in this project, and it did in many ways, but it also made it more difficult to look at my project objectively.
Overall, I’m very proud of my work and the journey I took with Doxn- the product is a great display of my current skillset, my growing love of design, and my eagerness to learn more.