USING THE SPRINT METHOD TO TEST:

HOW TO HELP URBANITES FIND THE RIGHT PET

The Challenge.

City Pups is a new startup that wants to help people living in cities find the perfect dog to adopt. Through research and interviews, City Pups has discovered that people living in cities struggle to find the right dog to adopt due to their unique needs

I practiced a modified design sprint for City Pups to quickly test out a possible solution to this problem. There is an opportunity to help city-dwellers find the perfect dog to adopt based on unique challenges such as living space; outdoor spaces; scheduling & public transportation.

The Sprint Method

jake, k.,John, Z. & Branden, K. (2016) "SPRINT: How to solve big problems and test new ideas in just five days" Bantam Press

The goal is to increase adoption rates and reduce return rates by helping city-dwellers find a dog that matches their unique criteria. Resulting in happier dog owners and better forever homes for dogs.

DAY1•MAKE A MAP & PICK A TARGET

AFFINITY MAP•Insights from user interviews & competitor usability tests

What Information Users Want To Know

TemperamentPhotosLiving RequirementsTime Commitment

Temperament: How does the dog behave around other animals, children and people? How does the dog behave in large crowds indoors and outdoors?

 

Photos: They want to see photos and videos to determine the dogs size.

 

Living Requirements: How much space does the pup require?

 

Time commitment: How much care and attention does the dog require?

 

I decided to focus on the part of the journey where the user defines the unique criteria for the pup that is just right for them.

Ellie The city dweller

I need to find a dog that will behave well with other dogs and is good in public spaces including public transport

I only want to see dogs that match my specific criteria. I don’t want to fall in love with a dog I cannot accommodate.

Day2•Sketching Ideas

Crazy 8s.

Solution Sketch.

The users get frustrated when they are unable to find dogs that meet their particular criteria. So why not guide them in defining their exact needs and only show them dogs that meet those needs?

Day3•Deciding on the best Idea

Ellie's Story
of
finding a dog that's just right for her.

Day4•Build The Prototype

Day5•Testing The Prototype

Users were not satisfied with only seeing a few of the dogs even if they matched their particular needs. They expressed making an exception if they felt a connection with any particular pup that didn’t meet some of their criteria.

Users also expressed that they expected all the dogs on the site to be good in the city because the site is called “City Pups”. They did not consider that other people also living in the city may have different criteria.

At the same time each users’ idea of what exactly a city dog should be was a little different.

Users expected there to be a predetermined criteria for the dogs listed on the site. For example: they expected all the listed dogs to do well in smaller living spaces and in public.

What I Learned?

In the end the solution did not excite the user as I had hoped but along the way I was able to get further insight into what changes should be made to better match the users’ needs. 

In this case I would have to redesign the entire flow. Users were not too concerned with narrowing their search; they wanted to see all available pups. However they needed guidance in understanding the meaning behind behavioral traits of the dog and how that links to the dogs’ needs.

Purpose of the sprint is not to prove how good the idea maybe but to test it to see how it might fail. It is far better to discover and fix the problems now than to realize them after spending months on development.

more from my portfolio

USER RESEARCH • UX DESIGN • UI DESIGN • USER TESTING

DISCOVERY • RESEARCH • UX DESIGN • UI DESIGN • USER TESTING