Taxi ride app for marginalized communities
UX Design | Product Strategy | Design Thinking
TakeMyCar is a mobile-based app that offers a platform for drivers from low income and marginalized communities to make a living, inviting riders by providing a good cause built on trust.
May 2020 - Jul 2021
Project Goal
To design the rider side of a taxi sharing app that provides an exclusive platform and income for marginalized drivers. This app aims to incentivize riders through intent, trust and money savings, supported by an intuitive interface.
Responsibilities
Collaborated with research and product to identify opportunities, issues to address and possible run-ins with app pain points. Developed user stories and tested concepts and UI to reiterate features and present final designs to stakeholders. Worked with dev to ensure feasibility constraints are met.
Impact Metrics
58%
Estimated conversion rate
83%
User Interest
Click here for final deliverables
Quick Overview
The purpose of TakeMyCar
This app gives a platform for drivers from underrepresented communities the opportunity to make a living by driving users to places they need to be. Being a brand new app in a super competitive niche, it aims to build loyalty through establishing a name for itself rooted in openness, reliability and safety throughout every step of use.
Marking a card through markup on phone
Nats Bingo sends out called terms to players on Twitter
Problem Discovery
Setting the tone
Before getting started, I defined the goal of this design and supporting success metrics to serve as a north star for this app.
Goals:
Transparency and clarity over app's vision and intent.
Money saving options to incentivize users.
Money saving options to incentivize users.
Success Metrics
1) Record a promising estimated conversion rate for when app is launched.
2) Document a high user interest rate in usage, present or future.
How might we build a solid foundation that invites users through emphasis on transparency, safety and trust, in order to steadily grow a committed user base over time?
Competitive Analysis
Assessing the competition
With the primary goal in mind, I collaborated with the research team to analyze the functionality of other applications in this niche and what their success drivers were in terms of services and user expectations. This helped to visualize how TakeMyCar's unique vision can show through design features, in order to shine through and become the user's go-to ride sharing app.
Findings and Insights
Key areas in focus
For this design, the following findings surfaced in importance when considering influential factors:
It's difficult to get users on to a brand new app
A new app means zero trust, and it was important to build a trustworthy interface from ground up, by content, interaction and visual cues.
A clear message to set the tone
There is a need to clearly convey the purpose of the app and what it stands for, to ensure the user knows the impact of their patronage.
Money plays a notable factor in app use
Other than trust and safety, the strong motivational factor is money - 75% of users said they would consider use despite hesitation if it helped with savings.
Ideation Phase
Defining user stories
Research made it clear that this process will require designing multiple standout features. I broke the scope down into the following 7 user stories from the gathered data - I decided on these based on priority for this phase of the project. This case study will focus on the first 5 user stories.
Users want to clearly understand what the app is about.
Users want to book a ride through the app.
Users want to learn about the drivers.
Users want to feel safe when riding.
Users want to save money.
Users want to view their rides' history.
Users want to connect with friends on the app for monetary benefits.
User Flows
Visualizing user interactions
These user flows represent what the proposed features need to include as part of the design and ensure the different interaction points are accounted for seamlessly, with clarity and purpose.
The design process
Design Kick-off and feature showcase
I set some over-arching design goals before embarking on this process to retain focus on the desired outcome. I also placed goals on each user story to ensure each feature is well thought-out.
Ease of use
Maintain the 3-step booking process proven by other platforms to keep the process short and simple while still showing the user all that's needed to make a decision.
Monetary incentives in play
Since saving money is crucial to user conversion, this design will highlight options to users wherever possible, strategically incorporated without adding friction.
Minimal design, maximum information
Strike a balance between design and information - users are well-informed through each step without any sensory overload.
A/B testing in decision-making
To finalize the view of the booking ride funnel, I went back to the users to get their perspective on which they felt was better.
We picked version A because users felt more "in control" of the process because every element including the map was visible to them at all times, and selecting a ride to see it on the map had a positive psychological impact making them more likely to book the ride.
Caller Prototype - Intended use on larger devices
Player Prototype - Intended use on smaller, mobile devices
Presenting a informative and functional onboarding process
The onboarding briefs the user on what they can expect from using this platform and introduces them to the mission, safety features and money-saving perks right away.
Users learn about their drivers while riding with them
Once users book a ride and are assigned with their driver, they now have the option to learn more about their background and purpose, giving the user this sense of satisfaction that they are supporting their service.
Quick access safety features built into the app
Users are able to share their live location with anyone through integration with other apps at the click of a button. There is also an SOS feature which allows users to send out an alert not only to a primary contact previously chosen, but also to 911. Their details are fully made transparent along with their live location. I chose to keep this a 2-click process just to ensure that there wouldn't be any accidental reports, and the second click acts as a confirmation from the user's end. This concept needs to be tested with the users to validate the extra-click design decision.
Testing the proposed interface
Validating design checkpoints
The product was then tested with the user base to check any assumptions made and concerns that arose during the design phase. Overall, users were satisfied with navigating through the interface and felt it was simple and intuitive. We observed that they were able to sense the purpose of the app and were comfortable with setting up and booking a ride. They were very happy to see the detailed information about the driver they would be riding with, it made it all feel personal and turned out to be a huge motivational factor in considering booking subsequent rides.
I was able to validate objectives and requirements through the following checkpoints:
Trust built for conversion rate
The app successfully established trust with the users through clear and open navigation. The transparency about drivers has been a winning factor in user support.
Onboarding serves its purpose
The message gets across to users exactly as desired, and users felt convinced enough to at least set up an account while considering booking a ride with the app.
Monetary incentives prove effective
The coupons seem to impact conversion rates - there is enough trust built through the app that saving money is the extra push that's needed to convince people to try it out.
Conversion insights from testing phase
To quantitatively measure what conversion values will look like upon launch, we surveyed 12 participants and asked them a series of questions to answer on a scale of 1 to 5 (1 being very unlikely and 5 being very likely) if they trust and are drawn in by the app enough to book rides. 7 out of 12 users expressed highly positive responses and said they are very likely to book a ride. The other users did not express any jarring negative concerns. 10 out of 12 users expressed strong interest in the concept of the app, showing us that we can expect conversion rates to go up once it gets established in the market.
Estimated conversion rate
7 out of 12 users said they would book their first ride.
Task Efficiency
10 out of 12 users said that they are super drawn to the concept of the app.
Future explorations
Other ways to monetize app use
Once the app has made its mark and has a loyal following established, we recommend exploring other avenues of generating revenue like trip insurance and rental cars.
Expansion into other areas of service
The client also has the vision of expanding beyond just a taxi app into the realm of delivery and vacation rentals - since this is a major pivot from the current proposed branding, we strongly recommended observing trends of users over time after app launch and then go back to research and design to see if such a change will sit right with their target user base.
Reflection
As a UX Designer, I was able to go beyond just the role of delivering design by playing a key role in research data mining, scoping and dev handoff. Most importantly this experience taught me how to handle client pivots and requirement changes by prioritizing based on time, resources, feasibility and necessity. Communicating with the client regularly and involving them through each step helped maintain transparency with them making it easy for all parties involved to collaborate efficiently.
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