Be Well - A Food Search Solution.
The brief: to create a site that provides preventative healthcare. After identifying a potential userbase in people with food allergies, I aimed to create a method by which users could find safe food, easy.
Introduction
The problem.
Food allergies and intolerances are a rapidly rising set of diagnoses that negatively impact quality of life. In the case of children, the psychological distress most often falls on the parents or family members of the affected person, as young children generally rely on their guardians to provide their food. While there are guidelines in place that regulate food labelling and cross-contamination during preparation, these often are not followed closely enough to prevent reactions, and can be unreliable. I sought to provide a solution that would help people with food allergies more confidently find safe foods.
The goal.
For this project, I hoped to complete high-fidelity mockups for a desktop interface. Deliverables included:
Secondary research report about the problem space
User research report from interviews
Affinity map
POV and “How might we” statements
Two provisional user personas
Storyboard
Sitemap
User journey map
Moodboard
Brand system
Component library
Wireframes of varying fidelities
A functional prototype
To ensure clarity and keep myself on track to meet my deadline, my design process from start to finish was separated into six segments: user research, ideation, information architecture, interaction design, user interface design, and prototyping/testing.
Exploration and Research
User interviews.
I scheduled interviews with five volunteers who fell into my target user base. While each interview followed the same script, the method used to collect data varied based on availability and comfort levels of the individual participant. Two interviews were conducted in-person, two were sent a written script and asked to respond in writing, and one interview was conducted via phone call. Every participant had a self-identified dietary restriction. At the time, I had not yet narrowed my focus to food allergies specifically; however, it became clear after these interviews that those with food allergies were by far the most impacted, and would most benefit from a solution.
After conducting an analysis of my findings, I was able to identify a common ground: the feeling that the user hadn’t been taken seriously in the past. All participants mentioned feeling overlooked or misunderstood, like people didn’t care enough about their restriction to attempt accommodating them. For the interview subjects with food allergies, this created the most friction, as a lack of accommodation could pose serious threat to their health.
Based on past experiences, the participants identified that they suffered from feelings of mistrust, and primarily stuck to foods that they had deemed to be safe. They didn’t often venture out and try new products due to the fear of a potential reaction. After careful review of my research, I was able to pinpoint this as the core problem that needed to be solved.
Personas.
I was able to create two personas from my research results: Khorshid and Debbie. Khorshid was a young adult with food allergies who had developed anxiety around food after having traumatic experiences in the past, and Debbie was a mother who worried for the safety of her allergic children.
Khorshid represents the segment of the userbase that has food allergies. His experience is made complex by the fact that he's burdened with the anxiety caused by past food-related reactions. Security and trust is a significant need for them.
Debbie is a unique persona, in that she does not suffer from any food allergies herself, but users like her actually make up a significant portion of the market. Since children are unable to provide food for themselves, their caretakers or parents are the ones responsible for making informed decisions about food safety.
Designing the Solution
Brand identity.
Crafting the right brand was crucial. The primary user issues discovered during the research stage involved a lack of trust; a feeling of not being taken seriously. In order for this product to be a success, the user needed to feel a connection with the brand. Colors, type, and shape language were all considered in order to emphasize the core brand values: safety, intelligence, and community.
Warm blue and green were used to promote feelings of savviness, compassion, and freshness. Yellow, lavender, and pink can also be found throughout the designs as accent colors, used sparingly.
Task flows.
I felt it important to fully flesh out three potential task flows: account creation, a product search, and a community search. Only one flow would be taken to the highest fidelity, but completing lofi mockups of multiple flows was essential to prove understanding of the information architecture.
User testing.
Five voluntary participants were consulted during a usability test of the Be Well prototype. The task flow being tested was searching a specific type of food and gathering insights on its nutritional information. This specific task flow was chosen to be tested because it most accurately represents the intended purpose of the product, and therefore yields feedback that would impact the highest possible number of users.
Users expressed great satisfaction with the visual direction of the product. All participants mentioned having thoughts of professionalism associated with the product, and felt the branded design choices were complementary of the product’s intended purpose. Users also remarked that the product was “user-friendly”.
The most criticism revolved around the user review feature. This was a great insight, as one of my hypotheses was a visible community feature would improve trust among users and ultimately lead to higher user satisfaction. That being said, the users that tested the prototype felt the reviews took up too much space, and weren’t as important as the rest of the information on the page. In my revised design, I made changes accordingly.
Conclusion
Final product.
My end result was a prototype that navigated the most common user taskflow: searching for the nutritional information of a specific product. Since Be Well was never intended to be developed, my success is determined by the qualitative assessments provided by my user testing.
The vast majority of the feedback received from my test participants was positive. Users reported feeling like their needs had been effectively accomplished, and multiple participants remarked on how trustworthy and reliable the product felt at every step. In this sense, I can conclude that the project was an overall success.
Lessons learned.
This project is built for scale. Expansions to the MVP could include:
A focus on user safety at restaurants specifically, which was an issue discovered in early research.
Another round of iteration and user testing.
Improved/expanded community features, especially the development of a “community rating” system to encourage users to feel confidence in the input of their fellow community members.
Ultimately, this project was a highly informative exploration into maintaining empathy and communication with a potential userbase. At the very heart of Be Well, I wanted to make life a little easier and a little happier for people with food allergies. For that community, something as simple as finding safe food can feel like an insurmountable challenge, and as my participants noted, the thing they hated most was feeling like nobody cared enough to try and help. I hope I was able to prove to my peers that nothing will ever replace good old fashioned caring about people. I also hope I was able to prove to at least one of my users that there will always be people who care.