Since my previous company had limited exposure to UX research, I joined the first Product Design Challenge hosted by AAPD to enhance my skills in product design and learn how to collaborate within a design team. Over the course of seven weeks, we worked together to complete a full product design proposal.
Competition Results – Silver Award🥈
We stood out among 21 competing teams, receiving high praise from industry-expert judges and earning the Silver Award! Below are some of the judges' comments
Judge － Simon Lin
Founder of AAPD / Principal Product Designer at Canva
In this project, I collaborated with five other designers. My primary roles were as a UX Researcher and UX Designer, responsible for tasks such as defining user interview topics, conducting interviews, competitive analysis, establishing a Functional Map, User flow, defining usability test topics, conducting and analyzing the results of usability tests.
User and non-user interviews
We interviewed 8 individuals, aged between 18 and 35, who commute using public transportation, and tested their user experience on BUS+. We compiled the strengths and pain points of BUS+ based on their feedback.
Persona
Non-fixed route
A 18-year-old college student
She is a female college student living off-campus.
She commutes to school every day and goes out with friends on weekends, primarily using buses and the metro.
She enjoys exploring and traveling, occasionally using uBike to explore the city.
When going to unfamiliar places, she will look up transportation options in advance.
Fixed route
A 25-year-old office worker
Commutes to work daily, primarily using the subway.
Often transfers between different subway lines and needs to manage time efficiently to avoid missing trains that could cause delays.
Occasionally goes out on weekends but prefers taking the bus over walking long distances. Efficiency-oriented and prioritizes precise control over time and location.
Based on the information provided by the company, the product's North Star metric is “Save stops,” so we adjusted the process for bookmarking bus stops to make it easier for users to access this feature.
Enhancing the user experience of the existing product by addressing user needs and pain points identified through interviews.
Improving the functionality for searching and scheduling trips to attract users interested in non-fixed routes.
While the product features are comprehensive, the complexity of both functionality and visual elements renders it inefficient to use
For instance, in the case of “Arrival Notice” and “Save stops,” these functionalities are only visible after clicking into the bus stop, causing some users to spend a lot of time searching for these options or even fail to discover the 'Save stops' function altogether.
The integration of transportation services across different counties and cities is a great feature, but the hierarchy is confusing
Transportation modes of the same hierarchy are placed in different locations. For example, the metro routes are located in the bottom navigation, which can cause confusion.
To serve commuters across different regions and age groups, it's necessary to enhance the product's universality
The abundance of information makes it difficult to interpret, displaying all buses with the same name across Taiwan at once without filtering for users.
Outdated interface design can affect the stickiness of usage among the younger demographic
We categorize users into fixed route users and non-fixed route users based on their usage scenarios.
Fixed Route / Commuting Daily
Non-fixed Route / Weekend Trip
Functional Map
User flow
We streamlined the process for "Save Stops" and introduced a feature and flow for saving trips.
Wireframe
Design System
1－Enhancing the user experience of core requirements to increase flexibility and efficiency in usage.
2－Realign feature layout and search logic.
3－Offering preferred transportation options and feedback mechanisms.
4－Establish design system and redesign icons to enhance interface design coherence.
Usability Test
Test Results
The time to save bus stops has been significantly reduced
The average time spent on saving bus stops has decreased by 71 seconds. Half of the users indicated that the location for the save stop function has become easier to find and use
Adjusting the search process has increased efficiency
Merging the bus inquiry and route planning search bars allows users to find routes more efficiently
Both users and non-users have seen improvements in satisfaction
User feedback
BUS+ owners and competition judges feedback
Expand user base
Due to time constraints in this competition, we didn't have the opportunity to understand the needs of other age groups who use public transportation. In the future, we hope to gather feedback from these users, analyze the data, optimize route planning, and other services accordingly. Additionally, we aim to develop user tutorials and promote them to users of other generations.
Integrate transportation management platform
Starting from Bus+, leveraging its years of focus on consumer-centric strategies and collecting sufficient user data, we aim to integrate cross-industry services. Once Bus+ matures and gathers ample user data, we aspire to collaborate with governments and transportation providers. Through user and bus data, we aim to create a platform that facilitates more efficient collaboration among all parties involved.
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