Cornelia Mrose

my neighbors: designing a neighborhood App

oct-Dec 2016

SUMMARY

PROBLEM ASSUMPTION AND MVP

USER RESEARCH

COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS

SKETCHES

WIREFRAMES

SITEMAP

PROTOTYPE

"Why should this app exist? Which problem does it solve?"

Life in American suburbs, exurbs and rural areas can be lonely. People that you might like, that might be helpful or that might turn into good friends, could live just up the road but you'll never know it.

Getting to know your neighbors is tough. In the winter, they are in their houses and passing your house in their cars. In the summer, they are in their houses with all windows shut since the air conditioning is running. And again, you'll just see them pass your house in their cars. Sadly, you know their cars better than them.

What is needed is an app: My Neighbors makes is possible for people in suburbs, exurbs and rural counties to get to know their neighbors and to stay in touch with them.

In contrast to existing neighborhood applications, My Neighbors is a highly personalized application. Users do not join an existing administrative neighborhood unit, but create their own unique neighborhoods.

Users can search for other users within their defined neighborhood and connect with them. They can direct message other users. They can also create groups and engage in group chat, organize events, trade, help each other, check on sick and elderly neigbhors, receive notifications from utilities and so on. The possibilities are limitless.

Users can also create more than one neighborhood. Perhaps they need a second one for their summer house in Vermont. Perhaps they need a third one to keep in touch with the neighborhood network of their elderly parents.

"What if I'm wrong? Perhaps this isn't even a problem."

To validate my problem assumption, I drove to the Stop & Shop supermarket in Mount Kisco, New York, and talked to 14 women who were coming into the supermarket to get groceries. I talked to women with young children, women who came alone, women from their twenties to their seventies. 

Four of the women did not pass my screener test since they lived in the center of either Mount Kisco or another town and were able to walk to shops, restaurants and the train station.

Ten women passed the test since they told me that they lived either in suburbs of Mount Kisco or further away in more rural areas of Northern Westchester County. I briefly explained to them the concept of my neighborhood app, showed them my wireframes and then let them experiment with the prototype.

Seven of the women liked the idea and saw enough value in it that they would download the app to give it a try. They used the prototype and four of them asked for additional features that are not part of the MVP.  Almost all of them had problems with some design features, especially the toggle switches for the groups.

Three of the ten women who passed the screener test were not convinced that they needed the app. All three had smartphones but two of them said that they used only a few mobile apps and were not enthusiastic about trying out a new app. One of the three said that she had no desire to get to know more of her neighbors or to get to know them better since she was too busy and knew plenty of people already.

Problem Assumption

• Many people in American suburbs, exurbs and rural areas are lonely, especially women.

• In many suburban areas, it is not easy to get to know your neighbors or to get to know them better. Many suburbs, exurbs and rural areas are not in walking distance from shops and few people walk the streets.

• Many women living in suburbs, exurbs and rural areas would like to know more about their neighbors and would like to get to know more of them so that they can socialize with each other, help each other, exchange information, organize events or become friends.

• In particular, women who just moved to a new neighborhood, might feel lonely and isolated. 

MVP target markets

1. Suburban, exurban and rural women with children who have recently moved to a new neighborhood.

2. Women who have been living in suburban or exurban neighborhoods for several years who want to find out about people in their vicinity with similar interests and lifestyles. 

Value proposition

My Neighbors is a Web application and mobile app that makes it easy for people in suburbs, exurbs and rural counties to get to know their neighbors and to stay in touch with them.

In contrast to My Neighbors' direct competitor NextDoor, the application allows you to define your own personal neighborhoods. You do not join a pre-defined neighborhood as in NextDoor but you define your own neighborhood. You can do this by selecting individual streets, by setting an adjustable radius around your own place or by selecting a number of individual houses. You can also define several such personal neighborhoods in case you live in more than one place. Once you have defined your own neighborhood(s), you will see a map with those houses selected where people live who are also using My Neighbors. 

So My Neighbors is a highly personalized application. You do not join an existing neighborhood, but you create your own. Since it's your own, it will be different from all other neighborhoods in My Neighbors but it will overlap with neighborhoods created by other people in your vicinity. When you define your own neighborhood, those people within it that have defined their own neighborhoods will be flagged on a map. You can then send an introductory invitation to connect to all or a selection of those neighbors. If a neighbor accepts your invitation to connect, she will become a connected neighbor in your neighborhood and you can start direct messaging with each other. The boundaries of your own neighborhood are fluid. You can at any time add or delete entire streets or houses or redefine your radius. You can also add individual houses. 

minimum viable product

The minimum viable product will be a core system with a few essential features. If the MVP is validated by users, additional features will be added and validated. Eventually, there might be many more features if users validate them as useful. The essential features of the MVP are the following:

1. The user defines her own neighborhood and profile and then connects to other users within her neighborhood.

2. The user messages connected users.

3. The user broadcasts to non-connected users within the neighborhood.

4. The user creates groups for neighbors within her neighborhood and engages in group chat.

Possible future features:

1. Events (creating and organizing neighborhood events)

2. Content (e.g. info about crime, schools, school board, libraries, elections, electricity outages, hydrant flushing, building permits, businesses, discounts, special offers from restaurants, hair salons, car repair shops etc.)

3. Giving stuff away within the neighborhood (toys no longer used by your kids, garden produce, plants, clothes that your kids have outgrown, left-over food after parties)

4. Helping neighbors in your neighborhood: old people, sick people etc.

5. Borrowing/lending (like snowblowers, steam power washers, mobile generators, sump pumps etc.)

6. Finding buyers in your neighborhood: selling stuff 

7. Finding resources in your neighborhood: tutors, babysitters, playmates etc. 

UX Design Case Study

My Neighbors is a UX design case study in which the application is developed from problem assumption to final product while validating each phase.

For example, in the solution phase the solution will be validated via user research and user testing to test the usefulness of the solution and also to make sure that the solution adequately solves the assumed problem and not a different one. If validation shows that the assumed solution is deficient, the solution will be improved and re-validated.

If it turns out that the solution actually solves a different problem but solves it well, then the problem assumption has to be re-validated. Perhaps the problem needs to be restated or perhaps the solution has be re-designed.

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Empathy Brainstorming

personas: Melissa

Goals and Needs:  

• Wants to get to know people in her new neighborhood

• Wants to make friends in her new neighborhood

• Wants to spend time with other women who also have kids and live close by

empathy mapping

pains-gains

Melissa's Story: What Melissa can do with the minimum viable product

Let's take persona 1, Melissa, as an example. She is 32 years old, married with a toddler and expecting a second child. Her husband commutes to work to NYC every day and Melissa stays home with her little son. A few months ago they moved from Brooklyn to Mount Kisco in Westchester County where they bought a 3 bedroom house. When they moved to Mount Kisco, Melissa didn't know anyone in her new neighborhood.

Once Melissa has defined her new neighborhood in My Neighbors, she can send out a message via the application's messenger system. Her message will be broadcast to all My Neighbors subscribers in her neighborhood. In this first message Melissa writes as much or as little as she wants about herself, her family and her interests and goals. Amanda lives just 6 houses up the road, reads Melissa's message and realizes that they went to the same college. She writes back to Melissa and invites her over for coffee. At this point, the two are connected in My Neighbors and can directly message each other.

Melissa can also create chat channels with her connected neighbors. To do this, she would invite connected neighbors to her channel. If they accept, they'll become channel participants. She can create as many channels as she likes and her connected neighbors can invite her to their chat channels.

What Melissa could do with additional features

• She can add content from outside sources like neighborhood.gov and either add it to her neighborhood map or create additional maps with specific content info. This way she would see information about electricity or telephone outages, crime and school district info and building permits that affect her neighborhood.

• She can also opt to see special offers from businesses within or close to her neighborhood. She can set the radius of such business related information herself. This way she'll get discounts and special offers from restaurants, hair salons, car repairs shops etc.

• She can add people outside her personal neighborhood(s). Let's say a friend lived up the road from her but moved away to a town 15 miles away. Melissa can add her to her neighborhood nonetheless.

• She can create events and send invites to people within her neighborhood or to entire channels.

• She can create as many personal neighborhoods as she wants. Perhaps she lives in several neighborhoods or perhaps she wants to add a neighborhood for her elderly parents where she can connect with her parents and neighbors who are able to help them in an emergency.

• She can create neighborhoods within the United States and abroad.

• Melissa's kids can create accounts where they connect with neighboring kids. This way they can easily organize an impromptu soccer game or ask for help with homework

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My Neighbors has three direct competitors:

• NextDoor

• My Neighborhood

• OneBridge

However, all three competitors fundamentally differ from My Neighbors since they let users only join an existing neighborhood. They do not allow users to define their own personal neighborhoods. Therefore, users can only participate in an organization that already exists. They cannot, as in My Neighbors, create their own highly personalized neighborhoods according to their own needs and wishes.

In NextDoor, My Neighborhood and OneBridge, users are assigned by location to an already existing neighborhood organization whereas in My Neighbors users create their own individual neighborhoods and connect with other users who also created their own neighborhoods. This empowers users to really take charge of their own neighborhoods and customize and use them in exactly the way they want.

nextdoor

Here are some screen shots from NextDoor's mobile app which is by far the most successful of the three competitors of My Neighbors:

my neighborhood

Onebridge

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Here are sketches drawn with pencil on paper to show the mobile app design of core features.

The first three sketches below show the login/signup screen, the homepage and the homepage with groups.

Login and homepage

define the neighborhood

The following three sketches show how the user can find her neighborhood: via radius, street selection or house selection. The user can combine the various methods. Melissa could, for example, first choose several streets and then add individual houses from other streets.

direct messaging and group chat

The inbox shows the groups Melissa belongs to and all her direct message threads. By clicking on the plus sign, she can add a new group or start a new message thread. By clicking on a group name, she opens the group chat. By clicking on an individual name, she opens the direct messaging page. Highlighted groups and names indicate new messages.

message directories

There are two message directories per neighborhood. One lists all chat groups and the other one lists all connected neighbors.

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The wireframes below will show the screens for most of the core functions of the Minimum Viable Product version of My Neighbors: signup/login, how to create a neighborhood, homepage, direct chat and group chat.

signup/login

Define your neighborhood

Here Melissa can define her neighborhood. The first screen gives her the choice how to define it. At this point, Melissa has already filled out her profile with her name, address and a short description of herself, her hobbies, her professional background and her family. She also chose a name for her neighborhood: Melissa Mount Kisco. Now she taps the circle with the choice she prefers. The following screens show the various ways of defining a neighborhood. 

In later versions, Melissa will be able to add additional neighborhoods. She is eager to add her parents' neighborhood in order to keep better track of her ailing parents that live in Iowa. She knows several of her parents' neighbors and wants to use the app to communicate with them in case of emergencies. 

homepage

The default homepage shows Melissa a map of her neighborhood with all connected neighbors marked by a red dot.

Her own house is marked with a blue dot. It does not show neighbors within her neighborhood that also use the My Neighbors app and whose neighborhoods overlap her own but are not connected to her.  

Melissa can tap on a red dot to bring up the direct message page and start typing a message. She can also select several dots and message the selected neighbors as a group.

inbox and direct chat

The three wireframes below show the message inbox, the direct message directory and Melissa's message thread with her neighbor Kathy Zilli.

group chat

Below are wireframes for the group chat directory and the Dog Walkers group chat. Melissa created the Dog Walkers group herself. Some of the other groups to which she belongs where created by others and she was invited to join.

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Here is a sitemap of the entire mobile app. The header and footer are visible on all pages.

sitemap: homepage view

sitemap subview: messaging

sitemap subview: footer

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Here is the link to the prototype that I built with Axure: http://zt7u0b.axshare.com

When you click on the link, the prototype will open in a new window. You will see an index on the left hand of the page. Click on login screen right below home at the very top of the index. The login screen will pop up on the screen. If you have a touchscreen, you can tap as if the app were on a mobile phone. If not, please use your mouse to click instead of tapping.

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