DOG GONE
App design
OVERVIEW
This project was tackled by myself and fellow UX designers, Merritt La Foe and Paul Becker. We were tasked with solving a real life problem through the creation of a mobile app. After many brainstorm sessions, and setting up our Kanban and Trello boards, we determined a need for an app that would aid in the discovery and recovery of a lost dog. I playfully came up with the name, Dog Gone, and it stuck!
PROBLEM STATEMENT
Losing a dog can be an incredibly stressful and heartbreaking situation, and each year, approximately 10 million pets are lost in the United States.* Deficient neighborhood familiarity and the lack of a central community communication platform decrease the odds of finding and retrieving a lost dog. How might we assist pet owners find their lost dogs in a timely manner and before circumstances become unsafe?
PROJECT GOALS
Produce a streamlined, ‘one stop shop’ app where users can quickly and easily report a missing dog to multiple resources and sites
Incorporate a chat feature that encourages and enables neighbors to interact and build beneficial relationships with fellow dog owners
Offer a platform to help in the notification and recognition of a missing dog through owner and pet profiles that include descriptions and critical information about the missing pet
RESEARCH METHODS
Our research plan began with five zoom/phone interviews with individuals who had experienced losing a dog. We wanted to collect this qualitative data in order to better understand how these various scenarios began, played out, and ended. Our team strived to understand the the emotions behind these situations, the many frustrations, and what tools or resource ultimately led to the retrieval of their missing dog.
We followed these user conversations by forming a survey that was distributed through social media. We desired additional quantitative information to further reinforce our findings and validate our hypothesis.
USER INSIGHTS
AFFINITY DIAGRAM
Using one Miro board to collaborate and document our research discoveries, we created our affinity diagram and developed our user insights. People who had experienced losing a dog stated that the more time that goes by without finding their dog, the scarier it gets. Users also stated that when they had some sort of relationship with their neighbors, they were more inclined to help them in the search for a missing pet.
Survey results uncovered that almost 60% of dog owners have had their dog run away. We found that over 90% of our participants used both social media and local animal shelters as first steps in recovering a lost pup.
Our data concluded that there is a need for a localized community platform for reporting lost dogs, a place where neighbors can report, communicate and support one another in the timely search, and hopeful recovery, of their missing pets.
USER PERSONA
Based off of our research and our understanding of our user, our proto-persona evolved into a flushed out user persona. We felt like Cynthia Wilson embodied our user demographics through her interests, wants, needs and frustrations.
STORYBOARD & USER FLOW
Cynthia works her way through our storyboard, “Tails of a Lost Dog”. By walking a mile in her shoes, we allow ourselves the understanding and feel compassion regarding the situation of her dog, Jack, going missing.
At this stage in the design process, we began to build out our user flow with the possible paths Cynthia could take during her time using the Dog Gone App.
PROTOTYPES
PAPER SKETCHES
I took ownership of sketching out the home screen along with some additional task flows. I envisioned a simplistic and approachable layout with only four possible options as not to bog down and dilute the main tools of this app. The most important task being the one to report a missing dog. I wanted that card to be the largest and at the top to demonstrate hierarchy and significance.
LO-FI WIREFRAMES
We took the concept from our sketches and embedded them within a Samsung Galaxy viewport in order to create these lo-fi wireframes. Minimal color and images were used. Our priority was to work within the Android Material Design guidelines and further build out screens for onboarding and the user tasks of creating owner and pet profiles (dog tags), reporting a missing dog, and interacting with neighbors within their community.
HI-FI MOBILE PROTOTYPE
We tested early and often on all stages of our prototypes in order to gain valuable user input. A portion of our hi-fi mobile prototype is included here, where the user goes through the task of interacting with and messaging fellow dog owner and neighbor, Sophia Silver.
CONCLUSION
Every user we worked with during this case study had a lot of love and care for not only their own dog, but for other individuals’ pets as well. That powerful emotion validated our decision to tackle this design project in signifying the absolute seriousness in having a streamlined app. A localized resource where users can quickly post of their missing dog to nearby organizations and social platforms along with efficiently alerting their neighborhood with a simple tap is critical.
We felt a lot of pride working through this design challenge, and were also deeply motivated to produce a good product based off the fact that we are all dog lovers and owners as well!