Dog Wlkr - Dog walking App
Dog Wlkr is an app that easily connects dog owners with dog walkers to book a walk or house sit a pet.?
My Role:?Product Design, User Research, Market Research, User Flows, Wireframes, Visual Design, Prototyping?
Time:?6 Weeks?
Tools: Figma?
Type:?This project was an assignment that was part of the Dribbble Product Design Course
The Challenge
Dog owners sometimes need help caring for and walking their dogs. Create a service to connect dog owners with dog walkers. How might we can help dog owners trust their dogs are in safe hands.
Visual Designs
The Dog Wlkr app screens were kept to a light, fresh, and minimal design but with added elements of animal illustrations.
User Research
I conducted the interviews in person with dog owners. My research revealed that many dog owners struggle to find trustworthy and affordable dog walkers. Several owners had dogs with anxiety or minor behavior issues and wanted an understanding dog walker.
I asked questions about:
Do you ever ask friends or use a service for dog walking or pet sitting? Why? How often?
What do you like about the service? What do you dislike?
Are there any services or features missing?
What are the most important things you look for in a dog walker?
Would you use a dog walking service?
Market Research
Market research indicated that Rover and Wag were the two primary pet sitting apps on the market that offered similar services. Both products had multiple features and lots of detailed information for the dog walker to gain a trust factor. I focused on opportunities to offer something different to the market:
Offer 2 clear service options
Search options before requiring customers to signup for an account
Get to search results fast
Non-cluttered dog walker profile viewing while still building trust with the dog owner
User Flow & Personas
I wanted to make the user flow as simple as possible and get the dog owner to the results as fast as possible with minimal screens and with collecting only the minimum required details. The rationale is to get the owners to the results screen as fast as possible and show them the trusted dog walker matches. Once trust is established by viewing the dog walker's experience, skills, and badges, the dog owner proceeds to account signup.
Wireframes
The first wireframe iteration has 9 initial screens. The screens included:
Onboarding
Service options
Pet details
Location details
Search results
Profile detail
Account signup
Chat
Book service
In the second iteration, I saw an opportunity to combine the onboarding screen and service options.
Prototype
The prototype walks the user through the process of booking a dog walk. Usability tests showed that more screens features should be built out for a complete testing review (filter, date, time, etc.)
Key Takeaways
Overall I am happy with my results during this Dribbble class assignment and completing the challenge of creating a service that connects dogs with dog walkers. This project really taught me how essential good user research, feedback, and testing influence the design process and iterations. My next steps would be to build out user flows and screen designs for the dog walker.