About

A mobile application and an Hardware that work together to make sure your plants are taken care of.

Role

UX Designer

Timeline

15 Weeks

Team

Solo

Download Full Case Study

01

Overview

How it Works

1. Planta Chip

The user buys Planta and receives 6 chips. One chip for each plant.

2. Connecting devices

When adding a plant the user adds chip to the plant he is scanning.

3. Plant Care

The application notify the user when his plants need watering, or are getting too much sunlight.

02

Research

Meet The Market

Patricia Plant

Finishing up her masters degree in Gas Emission. Rents a studio apartment in NY and loves to spend time outdoors. Is a multi plant parent and loves her plants do death but needs some help with keeping track with them.

Quotes

If there was a world record for killing plants I would be the current holder for sure...

Someone told me that its easier to become a millionare than killing a cactus. Ive killed a cactus and well...

I could not name a single plant in my household. How am I supposed to know how to take care of them?

02

research

Interview Script

For my interview script I focused on three different learning goals. Why becoming a plant owner, importance for plant parents about plant care, and what their thoughts are about how they and the economy benefit form plant parenting.

1. aSSUMPTION: uSERS DO NOT KNOW THE BENEFITS OF HAVING A PLANT

Question: Is there any certain reason why you wanted to become a plant parent?

Question: IF yes, what was the main one?

Question: Are you happy that you became a plant parent?

2. aSSUMPTION: Plant parents have a hard time managing the water cyles and care of all their plants.

Question: How is your schedule when it comes to watering your plant?

Question: What are your thoughts about nutrition for plants?

Question: Do you feel like there is a lack of informational database that consists all plants care?

Question: Do you know the importance of knowing your plant origin?

Question: What tools (can be paper and pen) do you use to schedule your plant care?

3. aSSUMPTION: Users are starting to focus more on climate change and their carboon footprint

Question: What are your thoughts on climate change?

Question: IF yes, what was the main one?

Question: Does it matter if you buy your plant locally?

4. The magic wand

Question: If you had a magic wand (make belief) and you can have anything you want within this context or application, what would your wish be?

02

Research

Conducting Research

I took notes while I ran the interview script through with 8 of my users. This allowed me to quickly understand the frustrations my users faces as well as opportunities for my product.

user quotes

Not knowing my plant specie makes it hard for me to understand what I need to do to take good care of it.

The biggest reason for me being a plant parent was to fill up some unwanted space, I picked a plant that I knew I did not have to take to much care of

I would love to know exactly when to water my plant, I always forget and it makes you feel really bad.

I think to know how much sunlight the plant actually needs, I am always moving my plants around the apartment because I think they are drying up to fast

I live in a study and have ten different indoor plants. I love plants and I would love to know more about my plants, information related to them.

Ive never given my plant any nutrition, is that a thing? if so I think it already hates me haha

Wish list/magic wand from users

Something that tells me how much water I have to give to my plant

An easy way for me to recognise my plants and give me information about them

A magic wound? I would want all my plants to get their nutrition without me moving a leg

02

research

Quantitive Research

I created an online quantitive research survey to get an even better insights for my focus groups. Overall about 42 people did the survey and it helped me a lot with both sorting out needs and different values that my user will have. A high percentage of the users felt that plants are only visual features for them and it helped me to start visualising the application experience and the need to have it delightful.

02

Research

Structuring Content

I noted down the most important quotes from my user interviews and structured them down in synthesis using Miro. When I was done I came up with themes & patterns for my product and card sorted the notes from the synthesis there focusing on the reason for becoming a plant parent, frustrations, and features or opportunities.

Synthesis

Themes & Pattern

02

research

Learning & Insights

As I took together all the insights from both my quantitive research and my user interviews I was able to list down learnings from my assumptions. These learnings were really important as they  gave me the end-to-end vision for my product.

Assumptions

Learnings

Users do not know the benefits of owning a plant

Because of the lack of informations users intend of focusing on the visual part of owning a plant

Plant parents have a hard time managing the water cycles and care of all their plants.

Yes, users do have a hard time remembering to water or take care of their plants.

Users are starting to focus more on climate change and their carboon footprint

Yes, users focus on climate change. But that is not a major decision for becoming plant owners

02

research

Sketching Solutions

To visualise the final product I sketched down possible solutions. In the end I came up with designing a hardware that would track sunlight, humidity, and vibrate to stimulate growth. From the app that connects to the hardware the user can scan the plant and as the application knows the plant it creates a watering schedule for the plant.

03

hardware design

Planta Chip

It was important to have it look  beautiful since many of the users get plants for visual treatment. The packaging needed to be small and unique. The colors were supposed to represent the calmness that the product brings to the user as he no longer needs to stress about his plants.

Features

Vibrates to stimulate growth

Tracks the amount of sunlight

Tracks the humidity

connects via bluetooth

04

app design

IA Mapping

04

app design

Visual & Usability Critique

Through zoom we presented our prototype to designers all around the world to gain visual and usability feedback. This helped me a lot achieving the final structure I wanted for the app. The designers commented through Figma while I shared my screen and ran through the prototype.

04

app design

Scenarios

Onboarding - New User

When a new user onboards he goes through a simple walkthrough with Planta as he adds his first plant .

Adding a new plant

Adding a new plant is pretty similar as when you go through your first onboarding.

Getting Alerts

It was important for me to design alerts that were not too alarming.

Viewing Plants

The user can view his plants and see the hydration and sunlight status of his plants. Based on card sorting the humidity was the least important.

viewing schedule

A simple schedule feature for the user to see when he needs to water his plants.

04

app design

Final Prototype

05

Final Design

Onboarding

Slide for more

05

Final Design

Tracking Your Plant

Slide for more

05

Final Design

Adding a Plant

Slide for more

05

Final Design

Additional Screens

Slide for more

05

final thoughts

Takeaways

What I LEARNED

The importance of going in depth with interviewing the users. Card sorting helped me a lot visualising the final product.

That I do not have to tackle all the problems to serve the users. Trying to focus on the highest priorities safed me a lot of time.

I learned a lot about plants, and their importance in homes as well as outdoors. In the process of doing this I added 3 plants to my apartment.

planta 2.0

I think it would be a more globalised approach. Creating a layout for Amazon product page and looking at how IoT products are sold on there.

Something sustainable. The battery will die. I think it is interesting to look at some of the bamboo products that recharge in the sun.

Expanding to the outdoors and see how it would function in peoples yards or even in some greenhouses.

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