Case Study: Planit
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summary
In an era, where data is stored on the cloud, there are endless opportunities for exploration. Planit is a cloud storing application used for planning trips with others in a more orderly and less stressful fashion.
The problem
Young adults travel at least once a year with their friends. They find it difficult to plan efficiently together due to a number of factors including, not being able to meet in person, difficulty including everyone’s perspective and differing levels of expertise on planning tools. This leads to frustration for the traveler when planning should be part of the vacation!
The process
I remembered the many trips that I went on with my friends and the struggles we had in planning on Google Drive. My roommate specifically, loved planning trips and would make spreadsheet after spreadsheet for each trip. I ran with this idea of a cloud storage application that focused on collaborating with others in planning a trip.
Competitive Analysis
I started with a competitive analysis of some of the competition out there in the cloud storage world. Specifically, I studied Google Drive, Dropbox, and iCloud. I spent a long time looking through each application and seeing areas in which travel planning could fit into each one. I noticed that the applications that I studied were geared towards offices or schools where collaboration happens everyday. I thought that a travel planning website could be a niche of its own. People may want to separate their personal lives from work, so that planning their trip can be part of the vacation.
Survey
I created a survey in order to better understand people's habits when it came to planning trips. I wanted to know what programs or systems they are currently using and what type of functions they wish they had access to.
User personas
Following the survey, I contacted some users for with questions for a more in depth understanding of their needs and habits. From these responses, I was able to craft two different user personas.
User Stories
Keeping these two personas in mind, along with my survey and the competitive analysis, I wrote out the user stories.
User Flows
Next up, I took these high-priority tasks and made users flows for them. By doing this I was able to map out a general idea of what sort of functions my application should have and got me thinking about the potential layouts. In order to do these user flows, I studied these tasks on other cloud storage sites to see all of the steps play out.
wireframes
I started my wireframes with a sketch of all of the screens required to accomplish the high-priority tasks listed in the user stories. I wanted an app that was simple and straightforward because planning in itself can already be stressful.
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Branding
I set about sketching out some logo options to kick start the branding process. I came up with five potential logos, but one of them really stood out to me. Planit is a play on the words "planet" and "plan it." It's built upon the idea that users are planning to travel around our beloved planet earth. This logo accurately communicates the value that planning should be fun.
Mockups
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