The Product
The Purrfect Health app is designed for cat owners and veterinary workers to keep track of cats’ nutrition and health - such as food and medicine schedules. It provides features such as food and medicine intake reminders to improve the well-being of cats.
Project Duration
April 2021 - September 2021
The Problem
Busy cat owners and veterinary workers lack ways of keeping track of their cats’ nutrition and health.
The Goal
Design an app that will allow users to easily keep track of their cat's nutrition and health while also understanding more about their cats.
My Role
UX designer designing an app called Purrfect Health from conception to delivery.
My Responsibilities
Creating surveys, finding target users, paper and digital wireframing, low and high-fidelity prototyping, conducting usability studies, accounting for accessibility, building a design system, and iterating on designs.
Understanding the user
I gathered data from various cat owners. Some go out of their way to give their cats the best nutrition and health. This can be stressful if your cats have different health problems and eat specific foods. Other owners are more relaxed about what they feed their cats and may not know if those choices are the best. Some owners need help finding a way to keep track of their cats’ health and nutrition. All of the owners need a way to learn what is the best food for their cat based on age, weight, and medical conditions.
Persona problem statement
Karla is a busy analyst who needs a better way to track feeding and medicine portions for her cats. She gets stressed trying to remember the different serving proportions.
Goals
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Find the best healthy food within her budget
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Find an easy process to feed her three cats eating different foods
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Volunteer in more animal shelters
Frustrations
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“I need a better way to track my cats’ health”
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“I get stressed trying to remember the different serving proportions”
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“It’s quite expensive to buy prescription food”
Goal
A better way to track feeding and medicine portions for her cats.
User journey map
Karla’s journey map revealed that the app will need different personalization options to give her reminders and correct recommendations.
Starting the design
Paper wireframes
The drafts of each screen have specific elements with asterisks on the side signaling that they were using in the refined version shown on the bottom right. The elements allow diminishing user pain points when creating a new cat profile.
Digital wireframes
Based on the ideas of the paper wireframes, I expanded on the options that users could explore while on the home screen allowing for a simple and visual style.
Low-fidelity prototype
The low-fidelity prototype connected the process of creating a new cat profile along with the options of adding food and medicine with a weekly schedule. This prototype could then be utilized in a usability study with users.
Usability Study
Parameters
Study type: Moderated
Participants: 5
Location: Remote
Length: 10 minutes
Findings
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Tracking feature: The features presented to keep track of a cat’s diet or medicine intake are intriguing with not many apps with this design like this on the market.
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Wider audience: There may be other users besides cat owners, such as cat sitters, or veterinarian offices that need to keep track of multiple cats for different people or organizations.
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Make it simple: The scheduling feature needs to be simpler to use such as the profile screen. The schedule button may need a “plus” sign
I conducted two rounds of usability studies. Findings from the first study helped guide the designs from wireframes to mockups. The second study used a high-fidelity prototype and revealed that the user profile icon at the top right may confuse users - thinking this is for their cat profiles, when it is in fact, for the user's profile.
Refining the design
Mockups
Based on the insights from the usability study, one of my focuses was to improve the app navigation. Instead of having a long scroll to add a cat's information, I added a submenu for food, medicine, and veterinary information.
The screen to add food items was confusing to users as the design wasn't familiar or simple enough. I changed the fields to add the food items and made them similar to the other screens. I also added a checkmark icon below the fields in case wanted to add the food items to a schedule.
Additional mockups
High-fidelity prototype
The final high-fidelity prototype simplifies the user flows to create a cat profile and add food items along with a schedule. It also allows for more customization options.
Accessibility considerations
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Color combinations including backgrounds and fonts were checked for adequate contrast.
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I decided to use a nav tab (bottom navigation) to easily reach the different features.
In action
Going forward
Impact
The app helps users develop a more meaningful relationship with their cats and their nutritional and health needs. It also helps cat owners have more peace of mind about their cats.
What I learned
Through usability studies, I learned that the app can have different uses that not only include cat owners - for example, veterinary offices. This feedback influenced the other iterations of the app’s designs and options.
Next steps
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Conduct more user research to determine more areas of need - including other animals.
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Conduct another round of usability studies with other types of pet owners and veterinary offices to investigate other pain points that could be resolved.
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Continue to improve gestures and motions in the prototype.