Greenery is an augmented reality eCommerce mobile app designed specifically
for indoor plant parents.
iOS • Android • Responsive • iUser Interface • Illustration • Onboarding • ECommerce
Challenge
How might we advise users to visualize and design their living spaces while helping plant parents feel confident in their tending and care of indoor plants?
Key Objective
Greenery should enable users to select indoor plants from a catalogue and virtually curate their homes through a smartphone or tablet application. After visualizing plants in AR, users should have the capability to purchase and learn how to tend to their plants utilizing the Greenery app.
Solution
From research and ideation to UI and implementation, I designed Greenery to allow users to view a catalogue of indoor plants and place them in their homes via augmented reality. I also designed Greenery to optimize plant growth stages, sunlight expectations, and seasonal suggestions based on the user’s geographic location. The application was designed holistically, with branding, logo exploration and development, and marketing concerns met during the process.
Design Process
1. Research & Synthesis
2. Architecture & UX Design
3. Branding & UI Design
4. Prototyping & Testing
Research
Greenery began with ideation, market research, and competitive analysis.
I drafted two research proposals inclusive of the need for both secondary and primary research. My professional experience of organizing battle cards, analyzing market positioning, and evaluating SWOT and competitor analysis helped form the foundation of the secondary research. In-depth in-person interviews and observational inquiry led a pathway through my primary research.
Research Goal: To develop an understanding of the indoor plant market, discover the target audience, identify the target demographic’s behaviour and journey when using plant-tending applications, and, finally, understand the successes and failures of competitor applications.
I analyzed the successes, failures, wins and opportunities of the current market.
Key Finding: Overall, there is considerable potential in the AR indoor plant conceptualization market within the sphere of eCommerce. Although, maybe the right questions haven’t been asked and not enough problems solved thus far within this growing market.
Notable trends with the interviewees were:
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Matching plant options to pre-existing aesthetic and interior design style
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Minimal and clean interior design aesthetics with indoor plants as accents
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Finding plant hobby personal and casual, and not needing to share socially
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Favouring smaller plants like succulents and cacti for ease of care and cognitive load
Needs:
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Centralized hub and catalogue with automated alerts for plant care
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Plants to dimensionally and aesthetically fit perfectly in a given living space
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Ability to order plants online after visually assessing the right fit
Pains:
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Not having an information hub for basic information on plants
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Having to “hope for the best” or “learn by failure” when it comes to plant care
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Shopping in person is overwhelming and doesn’t focus on pre-existing style and aesthetic
Desires:
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An indoor living space that is accented aesthetically by indoor plants
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Plant care and scheduling automation with regards to “learning as you go”
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Feel confident and knowledgeable about purchases and plant care
PLANTA
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Beautiful design and interface
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One of the most popular plant-care apps
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Discount on annual subscription
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Can recommend plants to beginners
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Most features (light meter, Dr. Planta and more) are available only to premium members
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Monthly subscription plans are pricey
Top Competitors for 2023
PLANT DAIRY
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Lets you customize your notes with a journaling section
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A fun way to track plant growth with pictures / notes
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Allows you to back up data, so you never lose your plant info
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Great free version, with low-cost premium upgrade ($4)
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Doesn’t automatically tell you how much water or light each plant needs
BLOSSOM
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Includes information for outdoor gardens
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Integrated shopping
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Disease identification
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Plant ID feature gets mixed reviews
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Best features are subscription only
PICTURE THIS
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Super accurate identification of all kinds of plants
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Disease photo identification
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Free to use
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Prompt to subscribe can be misleading, as it is possible to use the app for free
VERA
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Free
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Good in-app blog
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Must create an account and sign in
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Best for those with a little bit of experience
PRONS
CONS
Synthesis
Empathy Map
After analyzing the data, I synthesized the findings into manageable reference points, beginning with an empathy map.
Created from interviews, secondary research and observational analysis, the empathy map helped contextualize future users' encounters with Greenery.
Using an empathy assists me in making demographic and psychographic decisions that affect the persona, brand and overall design.
User Persona & Story
Contextualizing the target audience's brushes with plant tending and how a potential technology could meet their needs and goals allows me to mould a palpable representational persona.
User Goals:
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Have a living space and home that feels natural and inviting
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Feel confident in plant care and tending
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Simple learning curve to bypass barrier of entry into hobby
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Know all details of buying a plant, so there’s no risk of failure
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Plant care and scheduling automation
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Estimate dimensions in living space
Business Goals:
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Become an industry leader in the plant app category
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Create new logo, branding and UI design to position app in market
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Utilize technology to optimize plant growing for every indoor hobbyist
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Sell products through external vendors
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Keep product information and cataloguing up to date
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Recommend plants to users
Common Goals:
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Have a delightful plant tending and finding experience
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Stoke and develop a new plant tending hobby for users
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Catalog and information of products
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Order and receive new plants for living space
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See plants in live AR
Technical Specifications:
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Ability to login and sign up
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Account creation and control
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UI that has ability to work within AR constraints
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UI that works under iOS material design
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Accessible and usable to all groups
Goals & Features
Architecture
How Might We?
To create the physical product, I first acknowledged business aims and necessary features for user goals and then formulated a main architectural plan. The main architectural goals were developed by positing How Might We statements. These statements allow the ability to meet user needs while considering tasks and mappings of potential technology.
The particularly relevant How Might We statements followed the needs of the Amanda persona, with business goals considered.
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How might we help first-time plant owners feel confident in their tending and care?
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How might we create for users a more accessible and usable plant buying experience?
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How might we help plant hobbyists visualize and design their living spaces?
User Flows & Sitemap
Regarding the established architectural goals from the "How Might We" exercise, I identified tasks and user flows that would meet our user persona's needs, desires, and goals within the context of her life journey. I then applied these flows to uncover an application sitemap to provide the most practical route to those goals. Leaving room for iteration, I designed miniature wireframes in FlowMapp to help illustrate and brainstorm some of the potential screen solutions before moving into UX Design.
User Flow:
Task Flow:
UX Design
Interactions
After researching and analyzing design patterns that fit the information architecture, business goals, and user needs, I sketched solutions. Using rapid-prototyping and Marvel to move forward thoughts and ideas, I focused mainly on meeting the How Might We in an iterative process. I from sketches to wire-framing solutions and screens via Sketch and Marvel.
Wire-framing
Logo exploration
Style Guide
Final UI Design
Usability Testing
Interactions
After the high-fidelity prototype was finalized, a Usability Test Guide was written (see below).
Participants from different walks of life were then recruited to take part in a Zoom virtual usability test.
The test goals included the following:
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Identify any critical errors or incomplete task flows within the app
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Evaluate if the user comes across challenges with navigation or design
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Understand successful task flows and identify helpful UI features
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Assess to see that relevant information is in the right place at the right time
Each stated that this application would meet their individual needs and was successful in reaching their end goal.
There were many valid and interesting suggestions:
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Add dimensions to the plant information and AR function
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The ability to reach the care calendar through the plant profiles
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Favoriting on the AR feature
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Extra details about shipping and packaging information, customization of things like pottery and colours
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The ability to hold in a store, pick up from a store or talk to customer service.
The most helpful UI elements were the tutorial functions, the plant profile iconography and information, and the navigation tabs at the top of the fold. Above all, the most mentioned and commented navigation feature was the Filter option, and despite the Search and Care page not being used, both Filter and the Care Calendar were the most recognized as “important and needed.”