The Explorer
UX Design ︲ UI Design ︲ UX Research
Mobile App
2020
About The Explorer:
The York Museum has a lot to offer its guests, and that's why we wanted to make sure that visitors can always find what they're looking for whether that's the York Helmet or a sandwich after a long day browsing the exhibits. That's why I developed the one-of-a-kind Explorer app. The Explorer app is a personal tour guide that allows visitors to get custom tours based on their interests, receive location recommendations, play mini-games and quizzes about the exhibits whilst also providing access to wayfinding so guests never get lost.
The Challenges:
I developed a platform that addresses three main problems in experience that we narrowed down from research and visitor data:
- How to make attractions more interesting for younger visitors.
- How to improve the navigation around the museum.
- How visitors access the information about exhibits.
My Role:
I was the sole Product Designer of this project. I also received constructive feedback from other fellow designers in order to improve the platform whilst gaining other perspectives about the product I was designing.
Mains Tasks:
- Collecting customer insights & ideation
- Building the project vision
- Sketches
- User scenarios
- Wireframing
- Interactive prototype
- Developing the user interface
Design Toolkit:
Design Process:
The first step of the design process involved user interviews and desk research to understand how competitors and users behave. I believe it’s vital to get this information early on in the process, before having an idea or prototyping.
After analysing this insight, I began to conceptualise the solution, focusing on personas and sketches to give me a way to iterate faster through ideas. From this, I went into production mode, designing the interface considering design principles such as contrast, hierarchy and feedback, user interactions creating mock-ups and wireframes to do so.
Once the wireframes were ready, I took feedback from two other fellow designers in order to understand the experience gaps. I am a strong believer of gaining a wide range of feedback when designing a product as it is helpful to collect advice from different perspective to further enhance user experience.
User Interview:
User interviews are a core user experience method used in UX design. That’s why I choose to approach 20 people to interview at the museum. This allowed me to gather information from a wide range of perspectives that spanned age and gender from those visiting the attraction which in turn allowed me to collect enough data and inputs to generate concepts and hypotheses. After the conceptualisation phase, I took the prototype out to test with other users in order to gather further feedback and highlight areas upon which I could improve.
The interview sample took into account men and women aged from 16 to 70. The interview took approximately 15 minutes and included prompts to get to the core of what a user was missing from their experience and highlighted pain points of their visit. To find out this information I asked:
- When you visit, what do you want to do in the museum galleries?
- How would you like to find out more about an exhibit?
- What is your ideal museum experience is?
- Did you face any issues while at the museum?
Customer Insights:
What I wanted to know was what kind of experience visitors want to have when they visit, as well as why they go to the attraction. Despite the amount of data generated, this was the most relevant information for decision-making in creating the solution after analysing the interviews:
According to my findings, 80% of people prefer interactive and immersive museum experiences, while 70% prefer to see something cool while also learning. Furthermore, when asked to rate their experience, 60% of visitors said the navigation was very poor. With more research and the development of personas, the idea of developing an app that can combine navigation with an interactive and immersive experience emerged.
I also discovered that 70% of the people I interviewed said they were very interested in watching a video and 55% said they were very interested in playing a game to learn more about an exhibit. This inspired me to create the app in order to improve the visitor experience and expand access through innovative digital technology and devices that connect visitors with the exhibits and history.
Desk Research:
In addition, I researched data and habits related to other current Museum Apps. The goal was to understand how competitors behave and benchmark innovative attraction applications.
The article 6 Museum Apps for Virtual Field Trips, published by Mashable brings relevant examples to the discussion such as The Met, The Guggenheim, American Museum of Natural History and The Walt Disney Museum. Addressing different techniques for making museums more interactive.
Market Insights:
The main insights found is that over the past decade due to the rise of technology we are starting to see a rapid desire of museums to use mobile technologies due to their ability to engage audiences, whether within the gallery walls or beyond.When researching relevant examples, one particular type of app that seemed to be utilised by the majority of museums implemented navigation and GPS intergration. These location savvy apps are quickly becoming a modern successor to the traditional tour, giving museums the ability to orientate visitors both intellectually and physically.
According to Colleen Dilenschneider, who collects and analyses data for cultural organizations, museum apps have a low usage rate (6.1%) when compared to other media for visitors planning a museum visit, with web and mobile being the two most popular (77.7 & 77.5%, respectively). She also reveals that museum apps do not provide higher levels of satisfaction than other information sources during an on-site experience. However, given the low usage of museum apps, museums cannot afford to ignore the shift towards app and mobile usage.
One possible explanation for the low usage rate is that some apps are not developed by the museum but by a third party, usually for profit. These apps appear to be the official app of the museum, but they are not. This can cause a multitude of issue, with the main one being the museum’s integrity being potentially jepardised. The British Museum in London, for example, does not appear to have its own app, but there are at least four created by third parties. All have in-app purchases; the majority have negative customer reviews. As a museum app, there are several technical challenges that must be overcome. Battery drain, largely from the navigation systems built into the app that tracks a visitor’s location, downloading app content taking up storage on a user’s device, crashing and freezing, and audio tours only working with plug-in earbuds. These were the main issues found that would need to be addressed in order to enhance user experience and make the app utilisation worthwhile and stress-free.
Concept:
A digital platform for museum visitors to use as their personal tour guide allowing them to get custom tour, exhibits recommendations, mini-games and quizzes and access wayfinding so they never get lost.
User Personas:
Based on the information I gathered from my research on competitors in the museum app market as well as interviews with potential users, I decided to spend more time researching the types of people who might use the app. By creating a persona, I was able to analyse the data from my interview questions and identify any emerging trends. I was able to understand who I would be designing for as well as the target audience's fears and concerns by analysing these patterns. As a result of this data, it is possible to develop an app that will meet the needs and desires of its users, increasing its success.
User Scenarios:
My user scenario became very useful in determining what motivates my persona to complete a specific task, which assisted me in discovering and understanding some of the potential pain points as well as identifying opportunities for improvement without getting too far ahead in the process. I was able to see what the key tasks are by creating a scenario map, which allowed me to start adding context to my scenario, such as what, where, and why. After mapping out the key tasks, I was able to gain a clearer vision of what the user experience should be. The data from this process also assisted me in identifying certain features that should be added in the future to Enhance the user journey and make it more seamless.
Wireframes:
I made a wireframe because they are a great way to see where each element will be on the screen. My wireframes have been designed to show shape, size, and position. Wireframing enabled me to demonstrate the app's features by clearly communicating how these features will function, where they will belong on a specific page, and how useful they may be. Seeing the features without any creative decisions allowed me to concentrate on the app's key features. Furthermore, by creating a wireframe, I was able to bring usability to the forefront of my design by forcing me to look objectively at the app's ease of use, link naming, navigation placement, and feature placement, as well as point out flaws in the app's architecture.
The Explorer Dashboard:
The explorer dashboard is responsible for giving users extra information about exhibits as well as helping them choose what they will see and how they will get there. As soon as a visitor opens the app in the museum, they will be localized in through GPS and then from there, they can choose their interests from a list which includes shops, cafes, halls and exhibits. Once they know what exhibit or hall they want to visit, they can press the "take me there" button. This will then use the GPS signal used for the map to direct users to the attraction via the step by step, easy to understand guide on their screen. Users can then scroll through major exhibits and points of interest that fit their choices and are either displayed as a list or as a map. The app will then show them the way to what they want to see and will give further information about the exhibits both in their natural and museum context: fun facts, history and pop culture in a way that is easy to understand for everyone.
Exhibits & Halls:
Due to the popularity of the museum across varying ages, we wanted the users to see the app as a virtual tour guide that makes learning as fun and interactive as possible whilst catering to the different age ranges. When it came to creating the pages for both the exhibits and halls we showed potential users numerous screens to get a feel for which one they would prefer. What we found was that most people didn't want a page full of text instead the app should be used for content snaking, making sure that visitors absorbed the most important information in a fun and interactive way that also allowed them to enjoy the exhibits and the museum
The hall pages offer users the chance to see what exhibits are in the specific hall as well as the “take me there function” that helps users navigate from wherever they are in the museum to the hall they want to go to. For each of the exhibit pages, there is a small description of the artifact written in an accessible format for all users which allows them to understand what is being said. There are also lots of photos that the user can flick through At the end there is a small quiz that users can answer to check their knowledge and see what they have learnt. There is a hint button that the user can hit if they are unsure on the answer.
User Interests:
In a museum as vast as the York Museum, a good guide not only informs visitors about exhibits but also allows them to choose what exhibits they want to see so they can create there own guide based on their interests. There is nothing worse than wandering aimlessly through a museum and based on my own personal experience and the opinions of other visitors, we all agreed. That's why I created the user interest page because the main goal of the app is to make the museum as entertaining and interesting as possible for visitors. Users can choose the exhibits they want to see and hide the ones they don't want to see on this page, which they can access from the “explorer dashboard”, allowing them to customise their visit to the museum to suit their interests.
Treasure Hunt & Eye Touch:
Based on our initial research, many people expressed their disappointment that the museum lacks anything that engages children and makes learning enjoyable. That's why I designed interactive features like Eye-Touch and Treasure Hunt for children aged 8 to 12, so we can introduce them to exhibits in a fun and engaging way. They use a combination of audio, video, and interactive games to create a tour that balances fun experiences like behind-the-scenes video footage and on-screen activities with audio-messages aimed at encouraging kids to look closely and interact with the exhibits. I believe that these features will entice the younger visitors to pay attention to all the exhibits at the museum so that they can learn as much as possible which would help them get a higher score at the games and quizzes available, adding a competitive edge to the museum experience that isn't often seen.
Colours:
The Explorer is built around content that is both fun and informative, and this is highlighted by a minimalist bright design. That is why when deciding what colour palate to go with I chose a colourful and playful tone. The colours I went with was blue and green which worked well together and helped to break up the white from the text to give the app a more youthful feel and stand out.
For the text, white was brought in to ensure reading and contrast, thus reaching appropriate levels of accessibility for all ages. The font used throughout the app was Avenir Next due to its youthful tone as well as being easy to read at any size and weight.
Typography:
Making sure the app was easily readable was crucial as it caters to a variety of age ranges. Due to its readability and compatibility with the user interface, I chose to combine Avenier serif typography with a sans-serif Demi Bold.
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