This page highlights STRATEGIES and RESEARCH METHODOLOGIES to help uncover insights and opportunities used to develop the concept for this app. 

// Framing Questions  //  Qualitative Research + Methodologies  //  Insights + Opportunities

//  User Personas  //  Journey Mapping + User Scenarios  //  Interaction Mock ups

IMMERSIVE APPROACH TO RESEARCH

Besides taking trips with people (yes! That was fun), I conducted interviews with travelers of various expertise and experiences. This included short term, long term, with friends, with children, local and abroad.

My goal was to reveal the different types of planners and travelers, their desires, goals, and what they felt was important to them when traveling with others. 

Personal Experiences

By taking trip and being very attentive to my own decision process, I was able to hypothesize the ways in which others might do the same. What are the various factors that make me choose something over another? Cost, proximity, familiarity? How do I collaborate with others?

Contextual Interviews

These were the most frequent as I could gain valuable insight in a very short amount of time. I looked at people's past itineraries, the types of things they borough on certain trips, and how planning changes depending on type of group they are with. 

Silent Observer Experience

Going on short day outting with people to observe their decision making process when deciding what they want to do next. What artifacts are using in decision making? What are the personalities that go into who makes the final decision? 

Story Telling

By getting a person to tell me their travel experience, I was able to gain insight on the things that surprised and delighted the user as well as frustrated them. I realized stories would changed when interviewed alone vs. with the group revealing group dynamics and the need to avoid confrontation in decision making. 

Notebook Documentation

I had a friend document their travels within a notebook I provided. A day to day diary of the way their experienced their travel. This allowed me to get a very deep and personalized view of their thought process in travel. 

For more on my Research Methodologies, Please click on the button below:

Insight 1: Not all Travelers are the same, nor do they want the same things.

• Personalized Preferences on Mobility, Dining, Things to do, Where to stay
• Personalized Preferences that are predicted through aggregated social media or geolocated places of interest
• Planning based on type of traveler and planning style

Insight 2: The need for planning is to have control over uncertainty and stress.

• Having a way to share planning responsibility 
• Having a way to pre visualize the next event
• Budgeting for the trip

Insight 3: Children and their preferences are often ignored.

• Giving children a way to express the things they want to do 
• A new shared experience between parents and children

Insight 4: People want to travel together but also the freedom to leave the group

• Giving users a way to stay connected with the group while they're doing their own thing
• Ability to see what everyone else is doing on their itineraries

Insight 5: Collaboration continues beyond the planning process. Decisions need to be made between members at all times.

• Making it easy to collaborate IN APP to allow for seamless discussions
• Getting Decision Making to be fun (gamification?)

From Research, I began to notice reoccurring PERSONAS 

PROPLANNER

• Planning type: Planning down to the minute
• Goals: Get the most experience out of the limited time (low cost, high value)
• Painpoint: Letting other people plan
• Making sure everyone is happy
• Planning and research is the the favorite part of the entire trip experience

FLEXIBLE PLANNER

• Planning type: List of places but no day to day planning
• Goals: Accomplishing the list
• Painpoint: Figuring out what to do next

IMPROV PLANNER

• Planning type: "Life is already planned, why should vacation be?"
• Goals: Stumbling upon things that aren't on a tourist website
• Painpoint: Being lost, not knowing what to do next

By telling a story of a hypothetical family trip, it is the best way to uncover gaps within the Travel Planning App.

This tells the story of a family who goes on a trip to San Francisco. They have varying degrees of planning ability and familiarity with their vacation destination and so the travel app guides them through pre-travel, during travel, and post travel. 

This is also a good way to test seamless flow and develop conceptual features to make planning easier, heighten the user experience, and provide intuitive interactions from one feature to the next.