Swapsies App
A personal project created as part of General Assembly’s UX Design Immersive Course. I created the idea, executed the research, wireframing and prototyping - working in the style of a sprint to be able to test a version of the app in the timeframe.
The Problem
From personal experience of becoming a parent and observing others around me, I discovered that child development was so fast, month on month, that a pile of new baby and child paraphernalia grew exponentially, as did my guilt about consumerism. Equipment is often bulky and useful for a short time. So, what do you do with it when you no longer need it?
A market place app which allows local parents to swap age-appropriate baby/child equipment to save money, reduce waste and be involved in a parenting network.
The Solution
The Process
Personas
Competitor Audit
User Interviews
Affinity Mapping
Empathy Maps
Stage 1 - Research
Stage 2 - Ideation
Low Fidelity Wireframes
Testing
High Fidelity wireframes
Feedback & iterations
Stage 3 - Development
User Interface
We created personas to represent the target users of the app to understand the frustrations and needs of a potential user.
Stage 1
Meet Kate
She’s 34, has a partner, works in media. Lives in a 2-bed flat in London, with 2 children - a boy, 3 yrs and a girl aged 7 months
Persona Creation
Charity shop doesn’t appreciate my donations
Bothered by the consumerism of her family
There’s no storage space in the flat
Frustrations
Goals
Engage with other mums
Find a way get rid of toys no longer appropriate to development of child and feel good about this process.
Stage 1
There appeared to be no direct competitors in this area, but we analysed those in similar fields and ‘borrowed’ functions from GoBaby, Mush & NextDoor which worked well.
Competitor Audit
Extracts from interviews to discover the validity of the idea. They were all asked the same questions and we deliberately didn’t ask ‘leading’ questions based around our pre-conceived assumptions.
User Interviews
“Everyone I know recycles, so the idea of aiding parents to reduce the amount of stuff they buy because they’re sharing it, definitely appeals to me”
“I go to lots of baby groups to meet other mums - so yes, meeting other parents in near vicinity is definitely a plus...”
“Seeing a neighbour using something I’d swapped with the group would make me feel warm inside. I like the idea of that more than donating to a charity shop.”
Stage 1
Our user interviews and other research threw up a number of issues and concerns about the idea. Some were an occurring theme with several interviewees, others just presented with an individual. We grouped all this data into categories Pay for Service, Concerns with joining a group, Sharing, Waste, Community, Storage.
Affinity Mapping
We analysed the potential pain points of the app to create a ‘happy’ on-boarding user journey and then created a user flow.
Empathy Map/User Flow
Stage 2
We planned the app with low fidelity wireframes and then tested the paper prototype on a group of users to discover what was intuitive and what needing changing. After making several amends based on feedback, we created a digital prototype with high fidelity wireframes to improve the user experience.
Wires - Low & High Res
Stage 3
Further work needs to be done to test the validity of this idea and creative. Other features like having a ‘code of honour’ over care of items, and creating a system of trust through swap gradings might address some of the concerns potential users brought up.
