Project Overview

Paw companions is a pet service app that discovers trusted dog walkers and pet service providers to meet the needs of busy healthcare workers.

I created this concept after seeing a gap in the market for healthcare workers who often work long shifts on their feet or on-call at odd times of the day or night and who need help taking care of their pets. I followed the product design process to meet the needs of these specific users.

Design Brief

The Problem

Dog owners sometimes need help caring for and walking their dogs.

Create a service to connect dog owners with dog walkers and other pet resources. Please consider how we can help dog owners find trustworthy and safe dog walkers/services.

The Role

As the product designer, I took on multiple roles to develop the best solution for this design brief. I started by conducting interviews, developing an affinity map, building wireframes, creating a visual design, developing a design system, prototyping, and conducting user testing.

The Solution

After identifying the persona through interviews, research, and affinity mapping, I created a solution focused on developing trust and reliability with the owner and the walker. The app focuses on highlighting detailed information about the dog walker's knowledge and experience, provides transparent communication, and provides availability/accessibility of dog walkers so healthcare workers with long shifts or who are on-call can still access the dog walker's services.

With paw companions, pet owners/healthcare workers just have to post their profiles, and will they will be insured that they'll have a trained and trusted pet care provider to help them when they have long days at work or busy schedules.

Design Process

1. Research & Empathize

User Interviews

I used the qualitative method and conducted three interviews. I interviewed two healthcare workers who owned dogs and one dog walker who's a college student to get varying perspectives. I asked questions that would help me determine people's goals and pain points when trying to find help for their pets when they have busy schedules.

2. Define

Affinity Mapping

I then created an affinity map that helped extract insights and themes to help design product requirements, meet users' needs, and develop other product features. I brainstormed with a group of people on the pain points & goals of the app.

The Pain Points

• finding a person/ people who are available at odd hours or a sudden notice in your area

• choosing a person /people who are trustworthy & reliable, they can trust within their homes or, if needed, have other areas to meet

• would prefer a person/people who have experience with or knowledge about dogs/pets and how to take care of them

The Goal

• an app that offers dog walking and other pet services with ease and trust

• the app will prioritize building the users' trust by providing transparent profiles, reviews, certifications, and open communication with dog walkers or any pet providers, as well as allowing them to meet the dog walker or provider outside of their home at a park if preferred

• ultimately, paw companions pets will focus on helping develop and build a working relationship with pet providers who can help healthcare workers with their dogs or pets during on-call or long shifts

User Persona

With the user persona, I highlighted the wants and needs of the app's target audience based on real-life data and used this information to help further make informed product decisions.

Competitive Analysis

I found a few dog apps in the market and noted their strengths and weakness to understand further the needs of the users' experience with dog apps. I used this information to differentiate paw companions app from what's currently in the market.

3. Ideate

User Flow

After researching and understanding the users, I mapped out a user flow map to help me reason what parts of the app I need to focus on and work through any errors or friction in the flow of the user's journey.

Wireframing

I created wireframe outlines to understand how best to translate the user flow and the research. My strategy was to create two different versions of the app and see what I could come up with. I focused on the wireframing process to help me develop the layout, information architecture, user flow, functionality, and intended behavior in two different ways.

Initial wireframe

Second wireframe

Mood boards & Style Tiles

I created three mood boards and style tiles to explore different visual design directions by researching current digital and graphic design trends. I went with the greenish-blue and orange hue mood board. These colors and this style best represented the user base for the app in terms of branding.

Wireframes: Evolution of Design

Design System

A design system creates consistency, familiarity, and reusability to enhance the user's experience. The design system I created below uses the first mood board's primary colors, text, and illustration styles.

Components & Illustrations

After developing the design system, I assembled a component and illustration library. Components build upon the user's experience by creating patterns with more specific and intuitive user experiences. I also enjoyed making my own illustrations to add a more personal and unique user experience.

User Interface Design

Once I finished the wireframing, visual design, and, eventually, the user testing, it led me to this final UI design. I used the greenish-blue hues as the primary branding element throughout the app to represent the user base, who are primarily healthcare workers. The orange hues are used as a secondary element to highlight the essential buttons on the app that guide users to complete their profile and make a booking and payment.

4. Prototype

Then, once I completed the visual design, the next step was to create the prototype. The prototyping process allows you to interact with the layout on an actual phone, which is one of the best ways to test if the design and transition worked between screens. This process helped me focus on what buttons and screens I needed to edit and what buttons and screens worked well. The video below is a prototype of the final edit of each screen.

5. Test

The last step was to have three users go through the app to ensure that the process of finding the right dog walker and the services provided by the app is intuitive to the users. I used three types of users to get different points of view on any potential missing elements within the app and to ensure I met the user base's needs. The first tester was a nurse practitioner in her thirties, the second was a healthcare teacher and nurse in her sixties, and the third was a UI/UX designer in her twenties. I noted the specific feedback given to me by each of the testers in the visuals below.

Test 1, 2, & 3

Next Steps

My next steps would be to build out user flows, wireframes, and visual design as the dog walker signing up for the app. It would be interesting and fun to explore what user experience and interface would be preferred when the dog walker joins the app and how that would change and better build on the current foundation of the app.