KITTENKAB

UX Research Case Study

In this case study, you'll explore the steps I took as UX Generalist to help the KittenKab app create a seamless online adoption process.

INTRODUCTION

As part of my Skillcrush UX class, I was approached by a client named, KittenKab to enhance their in-app adoption experience. KittenKab is a convenient app for ordering kittens to play with at the user’s home, with the ultimate goal of increasing kitten adoptions. KittenKab discovered they had an inefficient kitten adoption process, which leads to many kittens not being adopted. The existing adoption process requires users to commute to the KittenKab’s Chicago office to sign documents to complete an adoption. I was hired to research KittenKab’s adoption UX to determine an easy and efficient way for users to complete an adoption via the app, thus increasing the number of kitten adoptions.

THE PROBLEM

The client’s existing adoption experience: Users were complaining that their “time was limited” and it takes “too long to drive downtown to sign documents” for a kitten adoption.

MY ROLE

I was tasked with:

Ideating solutions for the users’ problems or pain points
Conducting empathy interviews
Creating user personas
Mapping out user flows
SWOT and competitive analysis

MY APPROACH

My approach to this UX project started by taking the following steps:

Connecting with users: Through empathy interviews and creating user personas, this allowed me to get a deeper understanding of who KittenKab users are and what they want.
Defining the problem: From the user data collection, I needed to distill what the root cause was as to why users were not made at home adoptions.
Ideating solutions: Based on the user research and defining the problem, I collaborated with other UX colleagues and stakeholders to explore all solutions and then, narrowed down ideas that we could move forward on.

Empathy Map

To understand KittenKab’s users better, I incorporated empathy mapping and user personas to aid in collecting user data:

What does a typical day look like for you?
How did you hear about KittenKab?
How do you feel about adopting a new cat?
How do you decide what cat to play with?
What’s something you would change about the app?

KEY FINDINGS

After performing research, collecting data, and analyzing the results, this is what I found:

Most customers enjoy the convenience of having the ability to rent a cat for a day.

Customers prefer to rent cats on weekends -- Saturdays and Sundays are the busiest.
Most customers already own at least one cat and are actively looking to adopt again soon.
A few users who have adopted through KittenKab stated it took them an average of 2-3 business days before their adoption was complete.

“My time is limited and it takes too long to drive downtown to sign documents that could have been completed remotely via smartphone.”

Emma McCord

Hand-drawn user flow of my initial solution idea

SOLUTIONS

After ideating some potential solutions to the users’ problems and pain points, I decided to move forward

with the following idea:

Adding a “Adopt Me” button in the user flow on the profiles of each cat.
Additionally, the client stated the required documents or actions needed to complete a full adoption via the app, which includes: adoption form, picture of state-issued ID, and collecting payment details.

Based upon this result, the UX Designer and I decided to move forward into the prototyping phase. During this phase, the UX Designer took the lead in creating a low-fidelity mockup of the adoption app added. These mockups were presented and testing internally before moving forward with a high-fi prototype.

LESSONS LEARNED

The biggest challenge or obstacle I faced during this UX project

was: collecting enough user research and working against the clock

to turnaround a proposed user-friendly solution.

The lesson I learned from this UX project included: finding the balance

between meeting the expectations of the client, but most importantly,

exceeding the desired outcome for users.