How might we increase the dog adoption rate in metropolitan areas?
Overview
My Role - Product Designer, UX Researcher
Timeline - 2 weeks
Tools - Miro, Figma
Deliverables - Secondary Research, Persona, Sketching, High-fidelity Mockups, Prototyping, User Testing, Next Steps Outline
Process - Design Sprint
Problem
City-Dweller Dissatisfaction
In 2021, the pet industry reached yearly sales of $123 billion in annual sales and continues to grow. However, people living in metropolitan areas cannot find an app to get matched with an adoptable canine that meets their specific needs. My team investigated the core problem and found a solution that could potentially satisfy urban dwellers’. Meet Jacob, the dissatisfied city dweller…
Busy Frequent Flyer
Jacob wants to adopt a dog but he has a very busy schedule with frequent trips to different cities. He needs a dog that is
Old enough to be independent when Jacob is busy at work
Well-behaved
Can travel with Jacob on a flight
Can behave well when its owner is not home
Disappointed after multiple interactions with dogs
The apps currently available in the market do not have these city-specific filters — as a result, Jacob feels frustrated and disappointed after his visits to the adoption center and interacting with dogs multiple times. So, How Might We increase the chance that Jacob will find a dog that meets his specific needs? Well, demand is going up…
65% Plan To Add A Pet To The Family In The Next 5 Years
Demand in the pet industry is rapidly growing, mainly due to the Covid-19 pandemic and thereby prevalent “Work From Home” policy implementation across all industries. According to Morgan Stanley, 65% of 18-34-year-olds plan to add a pet to their family in the next 5 years. Data also shows that they are willing to spend a higher percentage of their earnings on pets compared to older generations. (Source: Eby 2022 ) Yet, there’s the problem of City Residents…
75% of New York City buildings don’t allow pets
Especially for city residents, it’s nearly impossible to find the “right” dog to fit their qualifications and needs. “75% of all New York City buildings do not allow pets.” (Source: McRay 2021) To make matters worse…
670,000 dogs are euthanized each year
On the other side of the story, more than 3 million dogs enter animal shelters each year in the US only. Among them, an estimated 670,000 dogs are euthanized. There are a lot of opportunities to save them from this unfortunate fate. How might we save dogs for Jacob so he feels innocent? Up next, we take a look at a potential solution and its success rate…
57% Best-estimated Success Rate
Efficiency: Will Jacob watch the whole 30-second video? I came up with this map with the far left – a city resident – and the very right – a user who talks to an agent to learn more about the dog and the adoption process – written from the beginning. Then I began to fill in the blank. 3 out of 5 users were able to complete the task, yielding a 57% best-estimated success rate. Up next, I conducted a benchmark research on no. 1 platform in the market, Petfinder, along with two other platforms.
Description Distracts
Petfinder, AllPaws, and BarkBuddy are some of the apps that match dogs with people looking for new dogs. Petfinder is the most popular app, so I conducted competitive research on it. Petfinder’s filtering functions are on point, and the description of each dog is very detailed.
No Link To The Website
However, the descriptions are quite wordy and can get readers easily distracted. The YouTube links in the description section, circled in red, are not linked to the actual websites, making them useless. With this secondary research, I created my first wireframe and conducted user research.
A Glimpse of Content Entices User Swipe
I created initial wireframe and conducted five user tests. Many issues have been identified, such as a user’s confusion with the green filter button that is shown as a magnifying glass circled in red (she thought it was another search button).
Additionally, after expert review, it was pointed out that the use of arrows for more content is extra UI that is NOT intuitive enough, disobeying heuristic #8 - aesthetic and minimalist design. Instead, displaying a glimpse of the next content increases usability because the user swipes right. Here’s the modification that incorporates the expert feedback:
35% Satisfaction Score From SUS Usability Survey
In another round of user testing, I received some positive feedback on the overall flow and filtering system.
Confused about how to control the range of the bar
Yet the wireframe has received some negative feedback on UI details, such as one user’s confusion about how to control the range of the bar for the question, “how much energy do you expect from a dog.”
All five users with different ages and levels of familiarity with the mobile app were able to complete the task of landing on the last page - to submit an inquiry, yielding a 100% task success rate. However, while users in their 20s finished within two minutes (104 seconds and 112 seconds each), a user in her late 50s was able to land on the inquiry submission page only in six minutes (347 seconds). On average, users were able to finish the task in 194.6 seconds.
Two people gave 5 out of 5 points on the Likert scale for satisfaction - user 1 and user 2 both appreciated the ‘match percentage’ property that showed which traits of each dog match well with the individual user.
However, the other three users all gave 3 out of 5. User 3 stated he didn’t see anything special about this app compared to other alternative solutions. User 4 pointed out that two filtering layers might make users feel weary.
Key Research Insights
Videos increase engagement - they give much more opportunities for a user to get to know the dog's personality on a deeper level.
Users easily get tired doing the same thing
The actual number increases credibility - a match percentage of a dog with a human gives more credibility and familiarity.
Next Steps
Refine the wireframe
Test again for a better satisfaction score
Repeat!
Final Prototype
I'd love to learn how you think about the process and chat with you! Hit me up! :)
