FloraGoGo. It is an app-based startup that delivers floral arrangements and plants within an hour. The business plan aims to enable the local florists to claim the customers' incoming orders and deliver them within the requested time frame.
We were asked to create an Intuitive design system and branding whose goal is to bring an intuitive and beautiful in-app experience.
This is an Interaction Design Foundation UX Bootcamp project.
I was fortunate to design the whole project from scratch with the guidance and critiques of my mentor Nikos Kotsakis, from discovery through the research and interviews to ideating, creating, testing, and finally delivering the final MVP after enough iterations.
I found this project interesting in multiple levels of UX and UI principles, but above all, it was fascinating to design an app that demands for a:
- A two-sided marketplace, the supplier and end-user.
- Multiple levels of filtering and searching.
- Creating a brand, experience, and interface that is consistent.
To satisfy the client's request for a meaningful brand identity, I needed to define the brand attributes and its target audience.
Among all the valuable gathered data during the market research, some findings proved crucial:
Mostly gifts: Many customers may never see their order as over 80% of the consumers make gift purchases. This is an important issue for delivery service.
Behind with digitalization: The flower industry has stayed behind with digitalization in comparison to other businesses. This makes it both challenging and full of opportunity.
Analyzing 6 direct and 2 indirect competitors to back my design I surprisingly found out that:
Weakness: just one of our direct competitors let the users rate their products, which later in my user research proved to be a major trust issue.
Strength: No direct competitor asks for an obligatory account, encouraging users to shop.
I interviewed and observed both customers and florists who gave me an insightful wall of information about their needs and frustrations.
What does Natalie need as our main persona.
Natalie chooses between products based on their design and environmental sustainability.
What does Tom want as our secondary persona.
The quality of the product and the service are the most important factors for Tom.
What does Megan need as a florist.
Megan is my main persona whose success will decide our success.
Through a comprehensive analysis and synthesis of the insights I found the following repetitive common pains and needs expressed in different forms and I considered them as the core problems.
They need to be sure about the quality of their flowers and the delivery service because they want their order to be fresh, looking the same as its picture and have it delivered on time and undamaged.
They want to be able to customize their floral design because they want their order to reflect their character and taste and their desire to make the recipient feel special.
They want access to a well-crafted description of the product because they want to be sure of making the right choice based on their various needs such as care, symbols, and fragrant as well as properties like pet friendly.
During the Brainstorming and a session of "Worst Possible Idea" for a further push of innovation, I identified fantastic common grounds between the core problems our users were facing. And this was a game-changer! Based on their problem solving power I put them in three different categories.
Unicorn is one idea but can solve multiple problems simultaneously.
Alongside the solutions for user’s problems, our final product must also respond to the client's needs which were an intuitive and beautiful in-app experience. I found intuitive flow and beautiful brand identity two sides of the same coin which will together assure the user’s a pleasant experience.
I obtained a seamless user flow by an ordering process with the least clicks possible.
I achieved a beautiful and consistent branding style through an alignment between the brand identity and the business function by colors and typography.
And finally, here is how I created the new brand logo inspired by the current FloraGoGo brand logo.
Users want a fast and sustainable floral delivery?
Suggest them as the first option the closest florists. Supporting local businesses, lower carbon footprint, and less time to wait.
Do they also want to easily choose from the best quality and design?
Assist them in decision making by sorting the florists and the products in the meaningful and desirable categories for the users which were discovered during the research.
On the highest level of hierarchy categorizing the service into florists, flowers, and plants. And on a lower and more detailed level of hierarchy in categories such as the most popular, classics, our picks, and the ones which have received quality awards from user reviews.
Besides let them also narrow their choice down with further sorting options such as price range, flowers type, and color.
- Order related tabs: History, Track and Help
- Order details overview in a drop down menu
- In-app customer-florist chat
- Live status tracking
Users still do not trust the final quality of their order? Are they also annoyed to wait without knowing what is the status of their order?
I Built trust by letting them receive the photo of their prepared order in the order tracker.
What if some questions arise? Like, the florist finds out some flowers are not available anymore, the customer wants to add a notecard too?
Well, I enabled them to chat and solve the issues fast and easily.
Ok! What if despite all, some customers still do not trust and want to touch and smell the order? What if for any reason do not want to use delivery?
I Provided them with a picking-up option. It works as a further service customization and service quality, often it is going to be also cheaper.
- Keeping the user informed about checkout steps
- Reducing the memory load
- Supporting recognition over recall using icons in the wizard
- Supporting them with internal locus of control
Product customization brings value not only experience-wise but also KPI-wise. When the users are able to personalize the design, they are more likely to be willing to complete the purchase.
Customization section offers to the users:
- Arrangement wrapping color
- Include and exclude flower stems
- Sending personal video, photo, or note messages with the order
- Add on choices
I before all learned how deeply empathy affects problem-solving success. I saw how an empathetic understanding leads us to ideate various meaningful solutions that might come together and shape one whole answer for those human needs. Simple and powerful.
Besides, quick testing proved how it efficiently can show us the overlooked problems in our design decisions. How it can not only save us time and resources but ultimately save our whole effort from failure.
Developing the florist app. Exciting!
