Helping people experience authentic street-food safely.
Overview
More than 8 in 10 Gen Z travelers are seeking a unique experience — Expedia Group Media Solutions (2022).
Lonely Planet (a guide book company) seeks to reclaim leadership in the backpacker travel industry with the ultimate Travel Companion app. By revolutionize outdated guidebooks, embrace app convenience, and empower travelers to explore the world on their terms.
Problem statement
Struggling to connect with Gen Z: Lonely Planet's apps lack excitement and fail to engage Gen Z backpackers, resulting in decreased relevance. To attract this audience, they need a new app with more relevant and engaging features
My contribution
Product strategy User research Branding Mobile app design
The team
4 x product designers 1 x product manager
Year
2023
Process
Kicking the work off
After clients meeting, we created the project timeline and kick off with research. We spoke to lots of backpackers in Khao san road in Bangkok to deeply understand our target audience, their travel behaviors, pain points, needs, and preferences. Through qualitative interviews and affinity mapping, we identified behavior patterns among over 30 young backpackers in Thailand's 'KaoSan' and hostel area, representing diverse cultures of traveling and working as nomads. I also analyze direct and indirect competitors with similar ideas.
Research findings and persona creation
A significant pattern emerged — young travelers seek authentic experiences.
Authentic experiences
- Participants showed a strong preference for authentic experiences during their travels.
Finding street food
- Participants showed a strong interest in finding the right street food vendor and place.
Safe and healthy food
- Participants showed a strong preference for safe food and healthy eating habit.
.png)
Generated ideas
Based on our research findings, I generated some initial ideas for the user interface. I then evaluated and prioritized our ideas based on the user needs, the project goals, and the technical feasibility. I also created a user flow diagram to show the structure and the navigation of the application.
.png)
Creating the blueprint: Transforming user flows into wireframes.
We then evaluated and prioritized our ideas based on the user needs, the project goals, and the technical feasibility. We then translated our ideas into low-fidelity wireframes using a tool like UXPin.
Introducing Yummy Planet, a mobile app for travelers to experience authentic street-food safely.
.png)
Bringing designs to life: Converting wireframes into branded user interfaces.
The final solution was a user-friendly Street food application that help user find safe street food and get health benefit on each food.
.png)
Key learnings & next steps
The project was completed within the timeline and the budget, and the team delivered a high-quality product that met the client’s expectations and the user’s needs. The team also learned a lot from the project and gained valuable experience and skills in UX design and auto transportation. The next steps for the project would be:
- To conduct more testing and iteration with a larger and more diverse user group to refine and validate the final solution.
- To develop and launch a minimum viable product (MVP) of the application and measure its performance and impact.
Outcome
Backpackers were able to:
- Easily find street food vendor without asking locals for help while using the first version of the app.
- Time Efficiency Amplified: 10% average time savings on street food vendor search.
- Significant decrease in food safety complain, user were able to eat from food and translate each food properly.
- Cost Savings Amplified: Significant cost savings were achieved through purchase from the right food vendors.