PostUp: Find Your Ideal Place to Work
Day 1: Map
The Problem
“As a working professional who does the majority of her work from home, it’s not always easy to find the ideal work environment. I have three children under the age of seven. My house is cluttered in every sense of the word. It’s noisy and I regularly find myself crying out in pain as I step on yet another Lego piece. When I really need to get an assignment done, I like to leave the house and work at a local spot. There are a lot of places around me and they all offer great features, but it would be helpful to have a guide listing everything I’m looking for.”
Here’s where PostUp solves the problem. PostUp allows users to search for a place in their location of choice to do their work and filters the results with features they find valuable.
As a Springboard student, my role during this design sprint was to gather information to create a user map, sketches, and a prototype and conduct user testing.
The Fix
The User
I watched videos provided by BiteSize UX for my research. One of these videos included the persona for this project, Nina. Nina is a 34 year-old freelance copywriter based in Boston, MA. She works from home but goes to the city several times a week for meetings. She likes to go to local places to do her work in between meetings. She says she wastes a lot of valuable time looking for an appropriate place. She would like to find a place with good wifi and restrooms which is free to work in.
Through videos of interviews, I learned the pain points of potential users. They wanted features such as:
Good food
Free Wifi
Bathrooms
Close by
Quiet
Work-friendly
Not crowded
Lots of outlets
Photos of the location
I took all of these into consideration when I created the PostUp app. I wanted users to be able to enter the location where they already were or where they were going so that they could see what spaces are available to them. I created filters that will show options such as places with free Wifi, outlets, bathrooms, good reviews, and free parking.
I created a map of possible red routes through inspiration from the videos of user interviews and conversations with Nina:
Day 2: Sketch
Lighting Demos
I performed research of apps similar to the one I was creating. I used Maps and Google Maps as models. Both apps showed mostly the same information. They both featured maps, reviews, hours, menu links, and photos.
Maps
Google Maps
Crazy 8s
I had an idea in my mind of the two main screens I was going to focus on:
Map with a list of places near me
Profile of a place
I wanted to create my own design solution by building upon the ideas and inspiration I got from the lightning demo. I set out drawing my screens. I drew eight screens in eight minutes. This gave me the opportunity to not overthink each screen. I drew whatever came to mind as I thought of solutions. I thought about the user interviews I had watched and how I could solve each user’s pain points.
Day 3: Decide
My crazy 8 sketches gave me a good starting point. I then sketched my three main screens:
My plan was to have a screen featuring a map with the list of places, the main profile of the place, and another screen showing more details. I found it very difficult to fit everything I wanted onto so few screens.
The Story
After creating my map and initial sketches, it was time to combine them into the storyboard. The main flow of the app was the user entering their location, finding a place, and learning more about the place. I wanted to include four main parts of the place’s profile:
The basic screen listing their hours and contact information
A screen with more details about the space and what it’s like
A screen devoted to the food and drinks the place offers
Reviews of the place
It was important to me to fit in small details that would mean a lot to some people. As a vegetarian, I thought it would be nice if the place indicated on its page that it’s vegetarian-friendly. I also created options for a place to indicate if they offer gluten free or dairy free alternatives. I’m not a huge coffee drinker and I get disappointed when I go to a coffee shop and they don’t have much of a tea selection. For PostUp, I created a rating for if the place has a good tea selection to help people like me. I also created a rating scale for how quiet a place is and the quality of the coffee and food.
Day 4: Prototype
I had everything I needed to start my high fidelity designs. I chose to create my prototype in Marvel. I have used Marvel before for guerilla testing but I was not familiar with its design feature. I like learning new things so I took on the challenge of learning this new-to-me design tool. I’m used to using Figma, but I adjusted easily. I found the help I needed from YouTube tutorials and articles from Google. Isn’t the internet great?
The logo for PostUp was provided to me by BiteSize UX. I used its beautiful shade of green as the primary color in order to promote the branding of PostUp. I spent hours creating my design and I thought I was done. I then looked at the bottom of the screen and realized that I neglected to design any sort of navigation menu. If this wasn’t time for a facepalm, I don’t know when it is. I thought about where the user may need to navigate in the app and chose the three main routes:
My Reviews
Find New Place
My Places
After solving this problem, the app started to really come together.
I like sneaking a personal touch into my projects. I incorporated the names of some of the cats in my family on the list of places on the “Near You” screen. I also used the names of my family members on the reviews page.
An issue I encountered with the design that I didn’t anticipate was the screen to be cut off in the prototype. Parts of the system bar and bottom navigation menu got cut off the screen.
Day 5: Test
I conducted five in-person, moderated tests. I chose five participants that are friends and family. They all liked the design and said it looked user friendly. I asked the participants to perform three tasks:
Find a list of places that offer free Wifi, a bathroom, and outlets.
How late is Penny’s Place open on Fridays?
What did Gail N. say in her review?
All the participants were able to perform the first two tasks easily with no issues. However, when it came to the third task, every user had the same problem.
The way I structured the app was that the user would click through a set of screens to get the next feature of the place
The first screen displayed basic information like their hours and address.
The second screen showed more details about the place, like the noise level and available seating.
The third screen shows details about the food and drink the place offers.
The last screen shows the reviews by other users.
In order to get to the reviews, the participant had to click through the first three screens.
This was confusing to the participants and I understand why. The only link to the review page was on the third screen.
Some Changes
After the user testing, I made some changes to the PostUp app. I created links to the review section under the star rating of the place's profile. I also created direct links to The Food, The Space, and back to the main profile. This way, users would not need to click through every detail screen to get to the information they needed. I also edited the bottom navigation and top status bar so they wouldn’t get cut off.
My Experience
This was my first time doing a design sprint. I liked doing an entire project in just five days. Although my end product had issues and there were some changes I had to make, I think this was a great learning experience.
Here are some of the issues I encountered:
The flow of the app was not incredibly user-friendly
Using tabs could have solved this issue
Parts of the screen of the final product got cut off
My initial sketches and design did not incorporate a bottom navigation with more features for the user
I needed to add more features than just the ability to find a place to work because part of PostUp’s company goal is to attract subscribers and charge a premium fee. This is why I added a space for the user to add their favorite spots and a place for their reviews.
I think the overall design of the project is visually pleasing as evident by the feedback from the testing participants.
I’m the kind of person that works well under pressure and with a deadline. I liked that there were constraints on this project. I’m looking forward to more design sprints in my future.