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History X

An Augmented Experience

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Project:

Client-facing, Rapid Prototype

Role:
UX/UI Designer
Deliverables:

  • Research Analysis

  • Personas

  • Journey Mapping/Storyboard

  • Sketches/Prototypes

Design Team:
Spencer (Researcher)
Rachel (UX/UI Designer)
Sarah (Project Lead)
Timeline:
2 Weeks (Agile)
Tools:
Figma
Adobe Photoshop
Miro

Brief 📖

History X is a DC-based startup that empowers users to learn history through augmented reality.
Augmented Reality is an interactive 3D experience that combines a view of the real world with computer-generated elements.

The Problem 🧐

"How can I create a desirable experience about history?"

The team did an all-around analysis before formulating a project agenda.
Our client proposed a B2C business model to introduce an incentive to users into using History X. However, while this application already had existing prototypes and interfaces, it was missing a principal key to a positive user experience - research.
So with that information alone, we dove right in.

Introduction

The Kick-off (Week 1) 💻

Research: Market Analysis

During our first call, we discussed the scope of our deliverables for the first week. They were as follows:

  1. User Research (Surveys and interviews)

  2. Research analysis

  3. Competitive/Comparative analysis

  4. Personas

This allowed our client to set a starting ground for his users, and to better understand his target audience.


The team kicked off the project with a competitive and comparative analysis.

This allowed us to gauge applications similar to History X and their current standing in the market through their strengths and weaknesses. 

History X: Text

Competitive Analysis 💻

The team kicked off the project with a competitive and comparative analysis.

This allowed us to gauge applications similar to History X and their current standing in the market through their strengths and weaknesses. 

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Competitive Analysis

Comparative Analysis 💻

Next, we compared some of the functionality within each competitor to better understand some of the core features that History X may need in order to be successful and maintain high retention.

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Empathizing with our users🔎

Tell me what'cha know, what'cha really REALLY know!

The team created a screener survey to recruit respondents into a potential second round of interviews.
It was imperative for the team to formulate questions that gave us insight into the respondents:

  • Level of knowledge in history

  • Understanding of AR applications (PokemonGO, Geocache, Snapchat, etc)

  • Interest in gamified learning

  • Current medium to learn about History. (Netflix? Museums?)


Overall, our objective is to set the starting ground for the user's current desirability, with history as a subject.
 

User Research
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88%

Learn history through streaming services like Netflix

72%

Are NOT History buffs

56%

Have used augmented reality devices in the past

76%

Indicated they will enjoy history if it were interactive

User Interviews 📊

We then followed up with a second round of user research through 1-on-1 interviews.
But this time, we wanted to know how we can translate a user's interest in history into an engaging application like History X.

Some questions revolved around the individual's experience with:

  1. Their interest in History X

  2. Some historical categories they are curious about in learning

  3. Some existing tools they use to learn history


"How can we design an entertaining concept for both history buffs and non-history buffs alike?"

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Data Analysis 📈

There's so much going on here, so let us break it down for you;

We took the responses of our interviewees and used the power of affinity mapping to conclude these major takeaways:

  • Filtering experiences gives the user a sense of control over what they want to learn.

  • Social aspects incentifies a sense of community​

  • Gamification techniques bring about an engaging experience​

  • Pre-routed journeys (where a user explores a route with multiple locations) facilitate a connection with the user and the timeline they are exploring​

Hey, GREAT NEWS! 👏

Seeing that our results aligned with the anticipated outcome gave us a sense of affirmation and direction.

Moreover, players of Pokemon GO do not play because they like Pokemon, but for the sake of the augmented reality mechanic!
This sets off a lightbulb in our head, that History X can bring about a pivotal change in how individuals can learn about the subject.

However, this is only the tip of the iceberg. 

Now we needed to know,

"How might we cultivate loyalty to the brand?"

Image by David Grandmougin

The Real Reason Behind Pokemon Go’s Success

"The boundary between your physical actions and the digital experience blur, and the end result is not something you watch or something you play, but something you live through."

The Success of History X 🏆

History X can succeed on just the mechanic of augmented reality alone, but the true catalyst here is the expansion of how users can elevate their experience with premium access to exclusive locations.

As the application is still in early development, the team and I took the initiative to formulate a user flow for all aspects of History X.

 

Our objective from this task was to visualize how we can fit a B2C premium feature in the existing design.

User Personas 👩‍💻

History X already had multiple existing personas. In order to converge our data into a tighter target audience, the team and I consolidated some valuable information into 2 personas:
 

  • 1 based on the existing personas

  • 1 from our recently collected data
     

And here we have them: ladies and gentlemen, meet Cienna and Steve!

Personas

Customer Journey Mapping 💟

Once we had a general scope of our target audience, we designed a journey map about Cienna's timeline discovering and using History X.

Overall, our goal is to further understand some pain points that might become apparent throughout the exploration of this application.  Some questions we asked along the way was "for a busy bee like Steve Rogers, at what point will her usage to the application bottleneck?".

Journey Mapping
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WEEK 2

Once the team concluded the kick-off week with research-based deliverables, we then transitioned into a revenue stream development phase.

Brainstorming Revenue Streams (Week 2) 💰

Our client was passionate about delivering additional paid downloadable content ("VIP-accessed" locations) without overwhelming the user with endless obstacles as they use the freemium version.

This required the team to assimilate existing information to bridge some knowledge gaps we had yet to discover.

Our goal was to fit our final puzzle piece into the jigsaw puzzle.

However, in order to achieve this task, it was imperative that we comprehended the existing prototype. 

Creating the Task Flow:

With our user's needs in mind, we then dissected the existing flow (in black) to fit our new "VIP" premium experience (in blue). This way we can visualize how to seamlessly fit this feature without overwhelming our users.

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User Flows

User Task Flows ✔️✔️✔️

Agile UX Designing 🏃‍♀️

Now that we have guidance on the feature's new architecture, we began our ideation phase with our annotated sketches. We considered incorporating our client's existing UI elements into our low-fidelity prototypes during this process.
 

  • Map view with locked locations

  • Popup with pricing and benefits

  • Payment

  • Confirmation


We also built a completion screen for when a user completes a "journey".
We finalized our designs through Figma using the existing UI elements from History X's prototype.

 

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Low-Fidelity Prototype + Design System 🏃‍♀️

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Prototype

Final Prototype [Figma] 🏃‍♀️

Reflections and Moving Forward 💯

First of all, we thank History X for this amazing opportunity.

The team had quite a learning experience, especially during the second week of the project. We were not expecting the curveball thrown at us, but with one step at a time, we were able to swiftly catch it and develop clear, concise deliverables for History X's successful endeavors.

 Moving forward, we are looking to iterate and finalize our designs and consolidate all collected data into a legible hand-off document for History X's future designers.

Next Steps:

Some steps moving forward would be;

- Conduct usability tests and iterate accordingly

- Finalize the prototype into a high-fidelity design on Figma

- Collaborate with a developer to push the designs

Conclusion

Hey, you made it!

Thanks for viewing! Have questions? Let's connect!

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