Compost USA is an application developed with the goal of instilling
the habit of food waste composting and making people aware of the
impact of food waste on the environment and how they can properly
dispose of their food wastes. Compost USA does this by providing
educational tools, information regarding the local composting
infrastructure in major US cities, and tracking the composting
statistics and impacts.
Compost USA is built on the belief that "With the right tools, changing
the world can seem effortless". Thus, a majority of the efforts were
directed toward understanding the shortcomings of the existing
composting infrastructure and building the right tool to encourage
and provide aid in food waste composting.
The complete UX Design process was implemented with attention
to detail for this project. The research, synthesis, ideation, and testing
phases were completed sequentially with the goal of empowering the
user to have confidence in food waste composting and tracking
their impact.
Role
I worked as a UX Researcher and Designer on this project with major contributions in synthesizing the design and building the high-fidelity prototype. Additionally, I worked on research, journey mapping,
conducting user tests, and analyzing user test data
Methods and Approach
User Research, Screener Survey, Business Research, Affinity Mapping, Persona, Journey Mapping, Feature Ideation, Feature Prioritization, Heuristics,
MoSCoW Mapping, Wire-framing, Prototyping, and Usability Testing.
Tools
Figma, Zeplin, Miro, Google Surveys, Slack, Zoom, Keynote, Otter.ai.
Timeline
Dec 2021 | 2 Week Sprint
Challenge
It is estimated that 50% of garbage is compostable, 10% of global greenhouse gases come from food wastes, and 1.3 billion tons of food is either lost or wasted every year. Clearly, pointing out that food waste composting is the need of the hour for ensuring a better planet. Thus, there is an immediate need of providing access to knowledge and composting resources, a community of food composters, information regarding local food disposal and composting systems, and tracking the impact generated
Outcome
Compost USA has research, empathy, and problem-solving ingrained in its very fabric. Thus, strives to be the tool of choice by encouraging and simplifying food waste composting within the community by providing educational support, access to infrastructure, and validation through tracking of environmental impact.
Solution
Compost USA with its deliberate design helps the users by highlighting the "pounds composted this year" tracker, an educational page with an abundance of resources, a local services page to find details of local composting services, and a personal tracker to visualize the impact created by the user.
-
Home
A year-to-date global impact tracker and provides access to all different resources in a central location to users.
-
Education
One-stop shop to becoming zero to hero for all things related to food waste composting.
-
Local Services
Leverages GPS to track location and suggest food composting services in the neighborhood and shares their details.
-
Account
Easy to understand users composting impact on an annual and weekly basis and comparisons with other users.
Home Page
INSPIRE
Easy access to all different functions and services of the application.
Showcases the year- to - date global impact created by all the users.
Opens the door of the users to a community of food waste composters and community enthusiasts.
Educational page
EDUCATE
Uses a GPS tracker to locate the closest food composting services.
Provides operational information, contact details, location, and ratings.
Facilitates making a service choice and helps users act quickly.
Local Services Page
ACT
Educational resources are organized in an easy-to-find and access way.
Combination of both fundamentals and practical tips to make you a composting guru.
Composting techniques with step-by-step process explained.
Account Page
ANALYZE
Access to changing account information such as contact details, payment methods, and account type.
Creative visualization tools to track impact created by the user.
Comparison with other users and past trends to track progress.
How exactly did we get here?
Read about the overall design process below
Defining Our Scope
We as a community have been facing an environmental crisis for a long time now and it is only going to get worse from here on. Reducing energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, and waste generated are goals that we have focused on but their impact has not offset the negative impacts at all. Food waste composting if carried out in all households might be a grassroots solution that can significantly change the future.
How might we provide people with access to knowledge and local resources about composting and food disposal systems, as well as a way to see their impact and inspire them to to keep going?
our Approach
In our approach we implemented the UX Design process for this project which consisted of 5 different stages to strategically and systematically work in all the aspects of the project.
-
EMPATHIZE
Understanding the challenges crypto users face, information and resources they need, and how can they overcome it?
-
DEFINE
Delve deeper into crypto enthusiasts' and beginner's minds to understand their goals, needs, and pain points.
-
IDEATE
Synthesize research to identify and ideate which features will ease their pain points, and help them meet their goals.
-
PROTOTYPE
Leverage the insights to create designs that solve their challenges and develop a variety of such designs.
-
TEST
Conduct usability tests on the prototypes and gauge the user experience. Do users find it useful? What are the recommendations?
RESEARCH
Goal: Build An understanding of the industry and identify needs of the users
Affinity Mapping
In order to start to define how to solve our challenge and find trends through our research, we chose to synthesize our interviews through an Affinity Map.
Actionable Insights
Through our research synthesis we were able to identify 6 trending themes. We will use these theses themes to guide our goals for our persona.
USER RESEARCH
GOAL - We conducted 20-minute research interviews to better understand the experience of our target audience and empathize with their needs. This method was selected to gain essential qualitative user research and better understand our target market on a human level.
TARGET INTERVIEWEES
uSER INTERVIEWS
We chose this method of research in order to understand our target audience’s values, perceptions, experiences, behaviors, needs, goals, and pain points. This rich information will help us develop meaningful insights as well as a persona that accurately represents our target audience.
kEY FINDINGS
Defining Our Target Audience
Meet erina!
Erina is an Occupational Therapist who has recently started her practice in Denver.
Growing up she has seen people around her being passionate about composting but she hasn’t actively participated in it.
She wants to be a productive member of society and she is motivated by her influential and environmentally conscious friends. Being able to measure the environmental impact of her actions
will motivate her to keep making progress in her composting efforts.
She recently bought her 1st house in Denver, CO and
is facing numerous questions about composting.
She lacks knowledge & experience with composting
as
she never had the opportunity or services to do so.
-
goals
Wants to learn more about the process of composting and see if it’s feasible for her.
Wants to learn about composting services to increase her environmental impact.
She wants to educate herself about Vermi -composting & generate awareness about it.
She wants to be able to track the impact she is making and see her progress.
-
Needs
Easy access to information about what can and can’t be composted or recycled.
More information about what the city has available in terms of composting resources.
A push or an incentive to make her feel like composting is crucial for her life.
Turnkey ways to contribute to the environment in positive ways.
-
Frustrations
Lacks knowledge on composting and feels guilty about her consumption habits
Reluctant to pay extra for services and feels it should be included in the city services.
Misleading information about products makes it difficult for her.
Each city has different policies when it comes to trash/food disposal
A dAY IN THE LIFE OF eRINA!
Revised Problem Statement
After conducting our user interviews, gathering actionable insights, and creating a persona for our target audience, we invalidated our original problem statement slightly and revised it to better represent our problem space and our persona’s experience.
IDEATION & DESIGN
The design and ideation stages were carried out with the goal of developing new designs, features, and prioritizing them based on impact and effort needed.
-
MoSCoW
Essential and Low Effort
- Resources, information, and education on composting
- Local services (i.e. pick up and drop off)
Essential and High Effort
- Location services (GPS and ability to use a map)
- Tracking and/or incentives for people to impact
-
Feature Prioritization
– Home screen with scrolling
– Location services (GPS and ability to use a map)
– Local services (i.e. pick up and drop off)
– Tracking and/or incentives for people to view impact
– Resources, information, & education to help compost.
-
Design Studio
We utilized Design Studio to allow for all versions of the website build to be addressed by our team. We researched goals to help mold the design aspects of our website. Through understanding our prioritization matrix we were able to create an MVP (Minimum Viable Product).
Usability Testing Round 1
The usability testing was conducted on the Medium Fidelity prototype and the results, insights, and recommendations from this testing will be used to inform the High-Fidelity Prototype.
Mid Fidelity Scorecard Round 1
Key Insights from Round 1
Finding the nearest place to compost had the lowest success rate of 62%. This was primarily due to confusion created by the location icon on the home page.
The success rate for task 3 was 92% and all users found the task easy and the "Your Impact" button was appreciated by users.
The success rate for task 1 was 64% which was the lowest. Most users did not directly click on the "Local Services".
Final design solution
The user research, insights, persona goals, needs, and pain points, and results of medium-fidelity usability testing were all synthesized and integrated to develop the Final Design Solution.
High Fidelity Wireframe Task 1
Navigate to find the nearest place for you to take your compost to.
High Fidelity Wireframe Task 2
Navigate to find where you’d be able to identify what items are compostable.
High Fidelity Wireframe Task 3
Navigate to see how much you’ve composted so far this year.
Usability Testing Round 2
The High-Fidelity prototype was tested for the same tasks as the Medium-Fidelity prototype. A comparison of the usability test results is provided here.
High- fidelity Scorecard Round 2
Key Insights from Round 2
The success rate of finding the nearest place to compost increased from 64% to 92%. This increase can be attributed to the addition of a location pop-up overlay.
The addition of extra screens inside "Your Impact" made no change to the success rate but increased the time needed by 0:16 min and reduced the easiness rating by 6%.
All three tasks had a success rate of 92% and for each task, only 1 user out of 7 took an indirect path.
Before being UX Designers and Researchers we are a team of humans that inhabit this beautiful planet and thus, need to take care of mother earth. Through our work, we found how critical food waste composting is and are really excited to have built a product that will push us towards a better future. Along the way, we polished our UX skills and learned to empathize with a common cause, and drove the empathy to deliver results.
Next Steps and Recommendations
Add scroll bars, side arrows, and/or other navigation indicators to aid our users' navigation experience.
Continue adding statistics and data breakdowns to our Account and Tracking tool, to help users further see their impact.
Include more infographics inside the "Education" tab more interactive and scatter them into multiple pages instead of just one.
Build out all mobile and desktop pages and test with users over time to see our Tracking tool in action and continue making improvements.