Pawcity is a mobile application for iOS, facilitating cat owners to find a loving host in the nearby vicinity to board their pets for extended duration. Once the owners find the host they like, they will be able to chat, book and review the host.

Deliverables
iOS Mobile prototype

Skills and Responsibility
Market Research, Personas, IA, Wireframes Brand Identity, User testing, Production Ready Assets

Tools and Software
Sketch, Invision, Adobe CC, Principle

the challenge

Designing a cat sitter app dedicated to the needs of cat pet parents

Consider the stats: ASPCA estimated that there are 85.8 million cats verses 78 million dogs owned in the United States. About 35% of household have cats as pets. These households will need cat sitters at some point. Unfortunately, there are no dedicated cat boarding/sitting apps.

The challenge was to create an app that has no previous precedent. Also, the need was to ensure that it specifically caters to the cats owners that have different boarding requirements compared to dog owners.

User Research

Understanding User’s Expectations and Frustrations

Pain point:
There is no single pet boarding or home sitting app dedicated to cats. Main competitors in the market - Rover, Dogvacay or Care.com all club cats under a different 'other pets' category.

Pain point:
The existing UI of competitors, make it really hard to search, book, review and watch updates on the mobile phone.

Expectation:
Develop an app dedicated to cats and their needs for busy pet owners which is extremely user friendly to use especially on mobile devices.

COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS

Learning From Existing Solutions

It was vital to learn from the existing solutions ( Dogvacay, Rover and Care.com etc. ) - What they do best and what is lacking to deliver optimal user experience for users.

Strengths:
- Easy payment
- Reliable host review process
- Quick payment methods

Weaknesses:
- No separate process for cat boarding & drop-ins etc
- Unable to flag rogue hosts
- Hard to use competitor apps on mobile devices

Opportunities:
- An unexplored niche market of cat pet owners.
- Creating easy to use on the go app

Threats:
- Reaching the right target audience
- Possible limitation of market to cat owners

USER FLOW AND SITE MAP

IA and Flow from a User's Perspective

The main aim was to create intuitive flows that would help users complete various tasks of the app with utmost ease. Further, hierarchical diagram showing the structure of application were developed to ensure content is in places users would expect to find it. Click on the images to see detailed versions of user flow and site map.

Low and HIGH FIDELITY WIREFRAME

Putting Together the Brick and Mortar of the App

Wireframes create a blueprint for the app. First quick and multiple low fidelity prototype are sketched out paper. From here the best ideas are taken and high fidelity prototypes created. With the help of hotspots these high fidelity prototypes are brought to live just enough to user test the concept and user flow to find out any gray zones. Based on the results following, after several iterations, the wireframes below were finalized.

BRAND LOGO

Gist of the App

The idea behind this logo was to convey the message that the app is specifically meant for cat parents. These busy folks can find pet care easily in close vicinity through pawcity.

Also, this logo was design to reflect a modern and professional personality with a sort of cat friendliness as against a dog happy go lucky affability reflected in the competitors' logos.

Color Palette

Using the Power of Colors

Choosing the right colors is very vital for creating a memorable user experience and connecting with them at an emotional level. Concurrently, they can help the brand stand out in a very competitive market.

These colors were chosen to give a clean, modern, professional and trust worthy feel to the brand. Purple is associated with wisdom, dignity, independence, creativity, mystery, and magic - all of which can be associated with a cat's personality. Peachy pink was used to help bring out contrast where attention needs to be drawn.

TYPOGRAPHY

Modern and Professional

Some descriptive adjectives to the describe the app are- fun, professional, modern, efficient, trusted and fast. Avenir fits this description. Its geometrical and mechanical giving it a modern feel. At the same time, its open curves impart a certain level of friendliness, approachable and fun factor.

Additionally, Avenir is designed and optimized for on-screen use, screen rendering, and legibility. It is best suited for small-size viewing and performs better across apps and mobile devices.

And finally......

Bring the App to Life

Once all the basic elements are in place and user tests have confirmed the best possible interaction for the users, it is time to put all the pieces together and build the app.

Making the App Easy to Use

When users are not shown how to use the product and/ or a particular feature of the product, they are less likely to use it to its full capabilities. This often leading to higher churn rate.

Hence, the aim was to have a very user-friendly and efficient product tour for the first time users. This would show the simple process to perform the tasks at hand – and get them to the “Aha” moment as quickly as possible! For the more advanced first time users the skip option is always available.

Navigation

Search and Book

This app allows the users to first choose a service that is dependent upon the pet's boarding/ sitting requirements. Then to make it even more convenient the user can input specific filters to reach to the right service provider. The results displayed can be viewed in a list form or can be seen on the map so that the user can find the closest sitter.

Pet owners can then see the profile - basic information, reviews and services provided by each host and contact them directly with their booking requested. If needed, the app allows the users to add more customized details.

Booking

Making Payment in a Breeze

This is one of the most crucial aspect of the app. The aim here is to keep the payment process so easy that customers would like to make repeated bookings as many times as possible. Most of the booking details will be autofill. Since the user will be asked about it during the search process.

At the same time the actual card entry process will be broken down into 3 simple one-at-time steps to avoid confusion. This is let the user know exactly how long the payment procedure would it. Once complete it will be followed up with a quick confirmation screen to complete the loop.

TRACKing AND NOTIFICATION

Providing Service Updates

The survey results revealed that users expect to be fully informed about their pets whereabouts , if the service providers are doing what they are suppose to do and/or if they are facing any challenges. This entire process will help customers stay engaged with the app as well, which might prove to be very beneficial for the company.

PAWCITY