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Forrest in the sunlight

User Research

UX/UI

Branding

RAUSFLUG

Service Design - App

Timeline

April 2020 - August 2020

Team

5 ppl + Me

My part

Market Research
creating an interview guideline
conducting & analysing qualitative interviews
sketching​ & storyboarding
Branding
Prototyping

Methods

Design Thinking
​Market Research
Competitor Research
User Research
Qualitative Interviews
Prototyping

THE TASK.

​Our tasks was to invent an innovative service that solves a real problem.​​​​

DESIGN PROCESS.

*Note: Even though the process is displayed as linear here, it seriously isn't. During projects, depending on the research and new information that comes up through interviews, etc., I go back and forth. 

EMPATHIZE

  • Market Research
  • Qualitative Interviews
  • Competitor Research
  • Target Group Research​
    • User Stories​
    • User Journey Map​

DEFINE

  • Personas
  • Storyboarding

IDEATE​

  • Brainstorming
  • Sketching

PROTOTYPE​

  • low fidelity prototypes

TEST​

  • Testing the prototype with the target group

RESEARCH.

When it comes to finding out what service humanity urgently needs, you can, of course, draw conclusions about others based on your own needs. However, in this case, you have to be aware that you will almost certainly fail and lose a lot of money. In business, where decisions can have a significant bearing on whether a company succeeds or goes bankrupt, decisions must be based on reliable data. And that's the first step: active research in the form of interviews together with the collection of quantitative data is the best way to find out what people are missing in their lives and what is important to them.

 

And that's exactly what we did. 

How do germans feel about their free time?

Houses in Tauber Germany

90%

of germans feel connected to their hometown.

Relaxation on a hammock

77%

consider vacations important.

hiking couple holding hands

30 times

per year on average, germans go on a day trip. 

And here we have it: Germans have a strong connection to their hometown, consider holidays to be very important, and take an average of 30-day trips (~ 2,5 per month) a year. Once people are out and about, they mainly use the weather app, translators, navigation apps, travel guides, and apps for accommodation and means of transport. These findings not only show the relevance of active leisure activities but also that people want to feel safe and informed during their leisure time or holidays.

 

But although people use smartphones to organize their vacations and travel around, they lack inspiration for trips (34%) and new places to discover, which, for example, could benefit from additional tourism (60%). Nearly 44% state that they would use an app that helps them plan their excursions so they can have everything (planning, accommodation, navigation, necessities, etc.) in one place. Therefore, it is not enough for an app to provide inspiration for a day trip; users want a more comprehensive service so that they don't have to switch between Booking, Google Maps, DeepL, etc.​

Let's take a closer look at the day trips

Bike adventure with the family

48%

mention day trips to their immediate surroundings as the first alternative to holidays.¹

Young Designer drawing

7 hours

is the most common time span for day trips.²

Reaching the mountain top at a hike

65,8 Km

is the average distance between the starting point and destination for day trips³

User Interviews

Jung adults, Families and Seniors go for day trips more often than other age groups. So focussing on those and their needs will make the app more appealing and useful.

​

To gain a better understanding of their needs, we prepared an interview guideline and conducted 12 interviews (45 mins./person). We talked about their sense of home, their hometown, leasure activities and day trips. Our transcrips were clustered by using an affinity diagram into the topics sport, food, planning and its difficulties, nature and apps. 

Diagramm about the age of the main target group

Although we interviewed people of different ages, living in different regions and having different hobbies, they have one thing in common: They all feel connected to their environment, which they call "home". In addition, almost everyone said, that if they had visitors they would spend the time outside to show them special places and the regional nature. This lead to two issues the respondents claimed about: the feeling of not knowing about all the beautiful places around them and the problem of not knowing what to do to spend a nice day outside.

​

Although all of our respondents use the internet for their searches, they said that it is still difficult to get an quick overview about trips and important data like the level of difficulty and duration. Here is the need for a service that provides trip suggestions concering the users location. Besides this, some told us about the missing motivation to explore something new, but that it's - on the other hand - very inspiring to see beautiful pictures of spots on social media channels like Instagram. Visual elements and personal recommendations are attracting and motivating. Some of our respondents also told us about their difficulties to tell something about their trips, to explain how it was and to remember specific things.

Student living on the countryside , 18 yrs.

“I think there is a lot more to do but I don't know everything. It kinda feels like I'm doing the same things over and over again."

Competitors 

The desire for a service that combines all these aspects is more than understandable. The question arises, however, whether such a service already exists. Hence, we proceeded with a competitive analysis, where we encountered the usual suspects:
​
1. Komoot

  • Target Audience: Outdoor enthusiasts

  • Features: Route planning for hiking, cycling, and running

  • Strengths: Extensive map integration, community-based recommendations

  • Weaknesses: Focus on outdoor activities, limited urban exploration

​
2. GetYourGuide

  • Target Audience: Tourists and culture enthusiasts

  • Features: Booking tours, tickets, and experiences

  • Strengths: Wide range of activities and events

  • Weaknesses: Less focused on spontaneous and local exploration

​
3. Google Maps

  • Target Audience: General users

  • Features: Navigation, place discovery, reviews

  • Strengths: Global coverage, integration of reviews

  • Weaknesses: Lack of specific day-trip planning and personalized recommendations

​
​
SWOT-Analysis & Differences​
​
A SWOT-Analysis of those competitors showed that the highest differentiation potential lies within the following areas:

  • Personalized experiences based on user preferences and past activities

  • Community integration to promote local insider tips and reviews

  • Offline mode to plan day trips even in remote areas

  • Motivating people through challenges and gamification

    • Users can collect points to complete challenges thus boosting their motivation. With a certain number of points, users will automatically be able to redeem them for vouchers or donations. 

  • Supporting environmental projects

    • Since the environment is of high importance to us and our target group, we want to provide the opportunity of redeeming the users’ collected points for supporting environmental projects. We will offer a selection of good causes like flower meadows, nature reserves, waste collection, landscaping, biodiversity conservation, such as the Global Nature Fund for Biodiversity, etc.

  • Accessibility

    • Komoot is all about sporty outdoor activities. But we also wants to include people who want to enjoy outdoor experiences without having to be extremely sporty. Furthermore, Komoot users criticised that due to the difficulty of the trips, they find it hard to actually get out and go on a trip with Komoot. This is where we come in, the motivational outdoor app, which also allows you to discover your environment by strolling or walking.​

AUDIENCE.

So, we know an area that has potential (planning day trips), and we know what competitors focus on and what people wish for through the qualitative interviews. Now, we have to make sure that we trigger the needs of the target groups we identified. Let's analyze them.

BRANDING.

Logo

Logo of RAUSFLUG

The name "Raus Flug" is a motivation for the people to go outside on one hand and on the other hand it contains the word "Ausflug" (Engl. "Trip") which relates to our connection to trips. The eagle is an addition to the word mark and reflects the freedom of the flight. Moreover the eagle stands for foresight, courage and strength. ³ It connects the separate words "Raus" and "Flug" facing the top right corner to express the mobility of moving up and forward while holding together the word-picture-mark.

The Logo works with white font on a dark background as well as on a light background using black font.

Brand Pyramide of RAUSFLUG

VISION

MISSION

VALUES

Font

Baron Neue

​Baron Neue is a bold font with a memorable form. The "R" of the logo looks like a path, that crosses at a point. It's a clean and plain font, that doesn't distract from the logo (figurative mark) and is neither too feminine nor too masculine.

 

Calibri

​For the body, the font Calibri was chosen. It is a simple font, that is well readable because of its standardized letter spacings. The rounded corners of the font have a friendly appearance. Besides it contains many font styles like "bold" or "italic". ²

Colours

#12341d

#282626

#808080

#fafafa

#f9ae1f

USER JOURNEY.

Awareness

  • Susi gets a recommendation for the app, as her friends told her about their beautiful trip last Sunday.

 

  • She gets ads on social media and also sees a lot of posts from her friends sharing their routes via "Raus Flug".

 

  • On her google searches for activity inspiration, she finds "Raus Flug" as an ad (SEA) and generic listed on her search list (SEO).

 

  • In the customer magazine of her health insurance she reads, that they bear the costs for using this app.

Consideration

  • Susi gets curious, she visits the website to get more information.​

​

  • The more ads and shared postings she sees, the more interested she gets. She reads through the app's brief description and the comments in the app store.​

​

  • The trial months caught her attention and convinced her to download the app.​

​

  • During the trial month, she gets more information about the financing, and she contacts her insurance about bearing the costs.

Purchase

  • She downloads the app and uses the trial month and is so convinced, that she decides to keep it and pays the monthly fee of 2,49€. 

​

  • Susi sends the invoice to her health insurance company for bearing the costs.​​​​​​

Use

  • Susi is planning some trips individually. In addition, she also joins a challenge program, where she gets weekly suggestions. That's why she receives push-messages.

​

  • She uses the app during the trip and gets credits, when she finishes the route or reaches her destination.

​

  • After that, she highlights and saves her favorite suggestions on the map.

Retention

  • Back home she shares the routes and pictures via the app on Social Media, where she gets likes and comments during the following days. After that, she highlights and saves her favorite suggestions on the map.​

​

  • While telling her friends and family about her trips, she uses the gallery in "Raus Flug" to show where she has been. The pictures are sorted by time and trips, which makes them easy to find.​

​

  • Someday, Susi collected enough credits to get to the next level. As a gift, she can now choose one of the vouchers Raus Flug offers her. The next time Susi uses the voucher, she remembers "Raus Flug" and tells her friends where she got the voucher. (WoM)​

​

  • She also starts to upload new routes. Therefore, she gets extra credit and likes from other users.

RESULTS.

Mock-Up of RAUSFLUG

More Mock-ups are in the making!

RESOURCES.

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