Readest. A Design Report.
1. FINDING A SUBJECT
The second project of the Ironhack UX UI Design bootcamp was to develop the prototype of an app. It had to be done by oneself and had to be an app that helped make or break a habit. This app’s theme and functionality had to be chosen after a process of research. The last constraint was that it could not have the same subject as the app of Project 1. In my case, fitness and sport.
After some reading and thinking, I decided to start things off with a quantitative method. We were asked to solve real people’s problems, so knowing what problems were most common seemed adequate. I created a survey containing only open questions, even though I knew it was going to take more time to analyse. The questions were very carefully chosen and I expected, despite being very similar, to get different perspectives from them.
- What’s one habit that you’d like for you to pick up?
- What’s one habit that you’d like for you to get rid of?
- What’s one habit that you’d like for someone you know to pick up?
- What’s one habit that you’d like for someone you know to get rid of?
- What’s one habit that you’d like for society to pick up?
- What’s one habit that you’d like for society to get rid of?
Questions 3 and 4 were behavioural. When responders talk about something a given person does, they can be very precise and objective. Questions 5 and 6, on the other hand, were totally attitudinal and very generalistic in approach. Questions 1 and 2 were expected to be a mix match and held potential to bring about surprising discoveries.
When analyzing the survey’s data, the first thing that caught my eye was how the diversity of the answers grew as the subject got more distant from the person asking the question:
This, convinced me that the subject of my app should be the most voted in the first question, ruling out fitness and sport (my first project) and any health issues. I believe there are some matters that should be handled by medicine professionals, so I wasn’t willing to do anything about nutrition, smoking or mental health; all of them quite common in the replies to several of the qustions.
All things considered, the election seemed clear. Reading it was going to be.
2. RESEARCH PHASE
Once the subject was established, I planned the research to find how to approach it. I decided to hold serial of user interviews. The aim was to find some common ground on which to start building the app. I expected the interviews would be useful to detect user pain points, to create some affinity maps and to develop persona(s) that should take me closer to a final concept.
- Most of the times, people either read or don’t read. Very rarely people read a little.
- Despite lacking time and being very tired, 6 out of 7 said they watched series and movies on streaming platforms every night and the other one (the eldest) watch TV. As one of the interviewees put it: Netflix is easier.
- Also 6 out of 7 said they completely forgot about reading by nights, they didn’t even remember it was an option.
- Another common pain point was the lack of an appealing book to read; when people didn’t have an interesting book to follow or didn’t know what to read, they quit reading altogether. Some times, months could pass until a new spark lit their drive for reading again.
- Finally, all the people interviewed said they used their cellphones a lot or too much.
Analysis of all data available showed a perspective into the subject. If I can’t create more time for users and I can’t relieve their exhaustion, HOW CAN I HELP PEOPLE REMEMBER TO READ?
3. FIRST SKETCHINGS
To find a suitable concept to work on, ideation started with some crazy eights. At first, there was no clear idea in them and some ideas were as bad as recalling Microsoft’s old virtual assistant for Office, Clippy.
At one point, the ideation process seemed stalled. There was a clear idea of the screen showing quotes from books and then, from a user profile, linking them to reading websites like GoodReads and online stores like Amazon’s Kindle or Rakuten’s Kobo. Also, a possible name had been found: Readest.
4. FIRST PROTOYPE
There was still necessary to find a way to introduce those quotes to the user. Reminders, alarms and different sorts of notifications were dismissed because they would be very invasive and annoying and might end up doing more harm than good.
Then, after a lot of lefts and rights and ups and downs, an idea seemed to take: A screensaver displaying first sentences of books. And nothing else.
Many users wanted a good book to start reading again, and all good books start with their first lines, so it made perfect sense trying to hook them up with these quotes. The screensaver approximation was interesting and, also, original. Instead of nagging users with notifications and push messages, the strategy was to show them good quotes many times every day so that one night, two or three weeks from the present, instead of automatically sitting in front of the TV, they would want to start a book again.
5. USER TESTING & ITERATIONS
With the screensaver prototypes, user testing began, and users were almost unanimous in two aspects:
- Users wanted to interact with the app. Almost none was content with it being only a screensaver and the passive role that left for them.
- Users wanted the scope broadened out and wanted more than just opening lines, they didn’t like the sentences to be limited to that.
Because of these findings, the first sketches of the app where lookes at again and were the basis for the following development: A main screen for the app and a user profile section were users could manage their integrations and preferences (genres, authors, books…) Also, a big widget was deemed necessary because some operating systems don’t allow users to modify the screensaver function.
Once the first prototype was ready, testing offered very useful hints on what to keep, what to discard and what to refine.
The widget was the first point of contact between the user and the app. In some OS’s it would also be from where users saw the different quotes. Here, a pair of arrows were removed for clarity (were they a rating system? a scrolling feature?). Also, a very unatractive “r” image and a very confusing “more” button were removed and replaced by an arrow with the app’s name in it. That meant less clutter and more refinement.
The main app window was he place were more changes were needed and made. The first design decisions weren’t adequate and not only chose UI elements that were ambigous or hard to read, they were placed all over the screen making the flow difficult to follow.
After rethinking and iterating a few times, a user menu consisting of 5 items was placed at the bottom of the screen. There, it became easier to reach for the user’s fingers and removed the multiple profile buttons.
Finally, the user profile was the last screen that users had trouble with. If the general distribution and contents were generally liked by participants in tests, there was a major pain point in a section of favourite quotes. With that size and placement, the quotes were not only difficult to read and more difficult to navigate, they were unnecessary because they were a lower quality display of some quotes already on the main app screen. Reorganizing the navigation allowed to remove them from this screen and using the space for the users’ favourite books, something they appreciated in subsequent user tests.
6. FINAL THOUGHTS
The end result of this project is quite satisfying. From here on, important graphic work would be necessary to make sure a coherent graphic identity is present on every aspect and screen of the app. Also necessary, some deep thinking about what integrations would the app need and how they would be implemented.
