I gotta guy for that...
Since 2009, the gig economy has been reshaping how we view convenience and value. With same day service becoming the new norm, and millennials being the busiest generation ever, the market for home service providers is at an all time high. There’s one problem…millennial homeowners and renters alike report difficulty in finding reliable and affordable contractors that return on the value they promise.
This is the story of how we created a peer-based approach to on-demand home service providers.
Three Degrees On-boarding Page
DESIGN BY NEED
With the ubiquity and access of smartphones, the saturation in the home service industry is growing exponentially. Socially, the increasing cost of housing means that renting is cheaper than buying, and renters say they don’t feel comfortable being responsible for fixing someone else’s property.
Millennials tend to choose to live in high priced, heavily populated cities, and feel home maintenance is an unnecessary hassle. Millennials want their time outside of their work schedules to be spent free time and do not want to be bombarded by the thought of chores.
With millennials currently making up 70% of the workforce and modern lifestyles only get busier, sourcing trusted service professionals is more in demand than ever. The on demand home service industry grows to over $600 billion, With same day service becoming the new norm, providers need to maintain quality service and consistently to keep up customers expectations.
“In the end, there’s no time to take 10 hours to learn something, especially if it takes someone who knows what they're doing 3-4 hours to do it”
— Jeremy (User)
mom used to go there...
The Challenge
TRANSPARENCY, CONTROL & EASE FOR THE USER
Our goal for the project was to create an end-to-end customer journey of the home repairs process, in order to build a home services marketplace that brings ease, transparency and control to users. Wanting to be the Uber of home services solutions, our client wanted to offer a one-stop solution for finding, reviewing, bidding, scheduling and paying for home service requests. We wanted to create a seamless, time saving, curated experience, that gave users trust in the product and its offerings.
Our High Level goals were to:
Put the control back into the hands of homeowners and renters.
Provide both homeowner/renters and contractors with value, simplicity, trust and transparency.
Homeowners/renters will save time with a central database of home service professionals.
Offer both ends of the platform a streamlined, cashless payment system.
My Role
I worked on the research and design strategy over five weeks and collaborated with three other designers.
In addition, I worked as a prototype designer and a project manager.
The Kickoff
UNDERSTANDING THE JOURNEY
At the onset of the project, we didn’t have a clear understanding of the end to end journey of the on-demand home service experience. We had some preexisting insights, but we really needed to identify any problems or barriers users encountered when trying to make on demand home service decisions. We started by exploring the current landscape of the marketplace.
Down the rabbit-hole we went...
Early Insight from the Marketplace
During our exploratory research, we noticed some key identifiers in the market which show approaching trends:
Crowded home service app landscapes that offer the same extensive list services at similar prices.
Millennials are the largest consumers of online on-demand home services as they’re the largest on the internet.
84% of users surveyed prefer Word of Mouth Recommendations and say that reviews influence their purchases.
Whats a common thread between Handy, Taskrabbit and Angie’s List? They all claim to connect individuals looking for household services with pre-screened independent service professionals.
Initial Assumptions
Quick availability, localized integration, along with a company-backed guarantee to pair them with trusted and reliable service professionals is the baseline for success in the highly saturated on-demand home service market.
Despite knowing that we’re looking at a highly saturated market, there are a few unknowns entering the on-demand home service industry. To truly understand the motivations behind why individuals use On-Demand Home Services, we conducted user interviews with:
City dwellers in various sized cities that rent or own a home.
Comfortable with technology, but not experts.
Individuals that value convenience.
The Discoveries
VALUE RECOMMENDATION FROM PEERS
as well as VALUE PRE EXISTING RELATIONSHIPS, & VALUE TIME OVER MONEY. I wasn’t surprised to learn that users value trusted recommendations from peers and inner circles before looking online. They are busy and want tasks done right the first time. Finding the right providers for their needs can’t truly be verified unless they know the reviewer. So being skeptical of online reviews makes sense. How do we combat that find a way to leverage the trust that is already built, rather than trying to reinvent the wheel?
This was our breakthrough validation. At the end of the day, most users in the position of hiring these services are time poor and can't afford to spend more time doing tasks two or three times.
“I pretty much only hire people that my friends recommend. My cousin's a plumber and one of my good friends is an electrician so I would ask them first and if they weren't available I would ask them to recommend someone.”
-Emily
Reframing the Problem
WORKING BACKWARDS FROM PEER
Meet Rylie.
We’ve determined that in order to satisfy Rylie's need for free time, she needs to build a network of trusted professionals based on peer recommendations and find high quality service in order to have a home that she is proud of.
“I recommended contacting the people who we had worked with previously for debris removal because they do overall building contracting too. And they're actually right around the corner.”
-Alison
User Stories
Rylie recently bought a new house that needs a kitchen & bathroom renovation. She has found that word-of-mouth recommendations from her peers and inner circle lead to higher quality work. With her demanding work schedule, Rylie wants to spend her free time doing the things she enjoys. She wants to make sure that if she is hiring for a job, that it gets done right the first time.
Through our additional research and understanding of our user like Rylie, we were able to define our 4 key Design Principles that will be the basis of our design.
A successful business model will be one that focuses not only on getting things done quickly, but also providing a superb service experience for users.
The Solution
INTRODUCING 3 DEGREES
In an age where there's a healthy distrust of information, 3 Degrees provides you with a curated network of trusted contractors and users based on your pre existing social networks. Make your place feel like home with providers you can trust.
Degrees of separation, isn’t just for Kevin Bacon...
It Starts with On-boarding
It starts with on-boarding screens which allows first time users to gain an understanding of the app and sync their contacts and social media in order to create their inner circles.
Review a Past Job
There’s an alert to leave a review for a past job. Add the contractor to your favorites and find them on your home screen.
Use Your Peer Recommendations
You can book contractors using your peer recommendations and choose from preset times directly set by the contractor. You can also find contractors using the Search bar which will prioritize the list based on most liked and distance.
Chat Directly with Contractors & Peers
The message center gives users the ability to chat directly with contractors and peers within the app. Through messages, the user is able to clarify any questions on pricing or availability prior to booking. The contractor can then send them an invite to book the service
Connect with Your Inner Circles
The profile includes basic profile settings as well as your “connections”. Here, you are able to add new connections to your inner circles as well as view your friends profiles.
How We Got Here
Centralized Contractors, Trusted Recommendations
Four questions informed our ideas, concepts, and solutions for our design strategy;
How do you give Rylie the community she desires?
What’s Rylie’s perfect interaction?
How many unnecessary clicks until Rylie is wasting time?
How can the platform's voice and visual style stay in the background, behind the user's voices, and needs?
Through the use of divergent thinking associations such as Mind Mapping and 6-8-5 sketching, we were able to make decisions while also encouraging further exploration and innovation for our divergent concepts.
Reimagining recommendation systems for users to find on-demand home services.
We took those associated words and individually sketched ideas on paper to further elaborate and work through those concepts.
Through sketching, we found key themes throughout that we wanted to further explore.
Social Circles - We wanted to focus on our users to connect to its “inner circles” and their trusted providers.
Referral / rewards program - Which will keep our users not only accountable for their actions but also engaged.
Focus on Scheduling - Making sure to find trusted & verified providers that can be easily booked.
After developing and thoroughly exploring our divergent concepts we used the I Like, I wish, I want model as well as a priority matrix, in order to determine key concepts and features that should be included in our final design, ultimately meeting our users needs.
The concepts and features we chose to focus on were…
Onboarding - allowing our users to gain a top level understanding of how the app ultimately works.
An Activity Feed - Gives users updates on their peer recommendations
An in - app messaging service - allowing easy communication between both contractors and peers
Peer Circles - Building on this idea of 3 Degrees and creating a peer based network.
User Testing
Once we merged concepts and created a product that encompassed all of our target users needs, we set out to conduct usability testing.
8 individuals were asked to complete 5 tasks that would demonstrate the core functions of the product.
Precisely What We Didn’t Know
Deeper Understanding of Our Users Needs
Overall, users like the concept of sourcing recommendations from their friends and peers in order to hire contractors.
Users thought the onboarding process was informative and gave a good snapshot of what the app was about.
Users gravitate to the search function.
Overall, the app is easy to use and intuitive.
Users expressed how they loved the simplicity of the app however, still very informative.
Seeing the providers calendar as a plus.
"8 of 8 users found leaving a review of a recommended provider very easy but, 2 of 8 actually failed the task and didn’t know it"
Things to improve
The wording of the “inner circle” feature is misleading, and doesn’t fit with the simple, equable tone of the product.
Users want more functionality from the activity feed.
The focus should be providers first, with friends supporting that.
To see what providers are outside of their network.
The wording of the inner circle was off putting.
Users wanted more search options when looking for a provider.
"I know it's a Mid Fi concept, but its already proving how transparency and accountability of the provider can give control back to the user"
-Hannah (User)
The Outcome
Positive Results, but Much More To Do
After gathering together all the feedback and specific behaviors of participants, it was discovered that all participants suggest valuable insight going forward.
Include “Inner Circle Liked Providers” in the Home Screen.
Add/View Friends - “Add Friend” option under Profile section.
Leave a Review - Create a more clear notification that shows that a review is pending.
Build out Messaging a bit more to allow users to customize who they want to message.
What We Learned
Assumptions moving forward
Given our short project time, we only looked at the “first degree,” close friends - it’s integral to investigate the other degrees: friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends. The challenge will be balancing two things: providing as many avenues to find service providers to users as possible, and maintaining a streamlined, easy-to-use application.
We wanted to design an app for busy people to stay busy, while getting their projects completed with a piece of mind. That meant that beginning from the impression that users would come into this experience with a pre-existing social network that could make finding peer recommended quality providers a personalized experience. If they didn’t have a network connecting them to trusted providers, how would they benefit from using the app?
The app could/should be expanded to include different types of service providers, ranging from trades to hobbyists. The potential for this app is nearly limitless, possibly allowing your friends to recommend you to someone to do your laundry, or someone to paint your portrait. The sky's the limit.
With all this being said, there’s still a whole other half to the app the team hasn’t touched: the contractor side. This may be the most integral note in this document, and if anything is researched it should be this. Service providers would have their client circles, and they would have a circle for their recommended service providers. There should also be a validation / credibility / license-approval system, to ensure service providers are legitimate. But more (really any) research is necessary for this! Without this side, there’s no app.
That being said, if the concept really works and is based around trusted recommendations, there’s almost no need for ratings or reviews. Also, in testing a few users stated they wouldn’t use reviews, ratings, or the messaging system, because they would just text each other. This could also be addressed in future testing and iterations.
"This seems like a very good, simple and clean brand to me; it tells you exactly your intention.”
-Evelyn (User)
Previous
Lift & Shift
Next
Trail Up