Design Sprint
Google Maps Concept: Visual Directions
Confused after leaving the subway? New concept feature that improves urban navigation designed in just 5 days!
Imagine you have been underground for a while. You come out of the public transit to find yourself surrounded by unfamiliar buildings, a densely packed crowd walking in all directions speaking in a foreign language, and cars honking. You feel like you are standing out and decide to take a left. After walking for a few minutes, you realize you are going in the opposite direction.
As someone with no sense of directions, moving to and getting around in Brazil and Germany as an international student wouldn’t have been possible without Google Maps. However, navigating in big cities like São Paulo and Berlin has always been challenging because I often felt lost and confused after leaving public transits. This is because:
- There are no obvious indicators of where to turn and which way is north, east, south, or west.
- I can’t identify which side of the street I am on.
- GPS signals are lost or unstable after coming out of underground public transits.
Problem: people get lost after leaving public transits.
How might Google Maps enable users to find the right direction easier and faster after leaving public transits? I hypothesize that if Google Maps provided users obvious indicators of which direction to go, more users would use the platform for navigation, be less frustrated, and get to their destinations faster.
I decided try out the GV Design Sprint for this case study because I considered transitioning into UX/UI Design from an Engineering role and the Design Sprint would also allow me to prototype and test my career change idea!
Here is an overview of my workflow:
Pre-Sprint — Understanding How People Navigate
User Research
Before the Sprint, I decided to narrow down the problem space and target users based in Germany.
In order to understand how people use Google Maps to navigate and their experiences with public transits, I conducted 11 user interviews, recruiting friends and volunteers from the r/berlin subreddit.
I learned that there are two types users who react differently when they are lost after coming out of public transits:
Based on the this finding, I decided to target the task-oriented users because they are more likely to be frustrated if they are lost or confused after leaving transit exits.
Unexpected Insights:
Some findings were unexpected because they are not relevant to my own navigation habits, therefore, it was eye-opening to learn other people’s point of view:
Pre-Sprint Summary: user interviews provided insights on how people use navigation apps and their experiences with public transits.
Day 1 — Understand and Define the Problem
Start at the End
In order to create a path for the Sprint, the first thing that I did was to define the long-term goal and Sprint questions that I wanted to answer by the end of the Sprint. Here is what I came up with:
Long-Term Goal: help people navigate when leaving public transits
I first wrote down a list of Sprint questions that expressed the perfect future such as people finding their destinations easier and faster.
Moreover, since I found out that many users plan ahead at home and prefer to keep their phones away while navigating, I wanted to know if the directions can be made more obvious and memorable.
On the other hand, I also came up with questions by considering if the Sprint would fail. This led to the last Sprint question of whether people can discover or want to use the new feature.
I selected the most important questions that I wanted to answer and came up with the final Sprint overview.
Map
Next, I sketched a map of the user flow depicting how users would use the public transit option of Google Maps:
Digging Deeper
After setting the goal of the Sprint, I wanted to dig down to the root of why people are lost after exiting public transits. I used the 5 Whys method to iteratively investigate the problem and came to the following iteration:
Using insights from the user interviews and digging deeper into the root of the problem, I wanted to reframe the problem using How Might We Questions to turn those challenges into opportunities for design.
I came up with a variety of HMW questions and picked four with the most opportunity by referring to the insights that people like to plan ahead and prefer not to check their phones while navigating— How Might We:
- provide indicators of where to turn?
- help users minimize checking their phones?
- help users find a turn faster?
- make where to turn more obvious?
Target
I went back to the user flow and marked the places where the HMW questions can provide opportunities for a new feature. Then I decided to target the moment when the users first look at the route information because if the users can gain a memorable impressions of the directions via a form of indicator even before they start their journey, then they can minimize taking their phones out on the way.
Day 1 Summary: defined Sprint goal and questions, created user flow, and gained deeper understanding of the problem using the 5 Whys and How Might We questions to decide on a target moment in the user flow.
Days 2 & 3—Sketch & Decide on the Solution
After understanding the users and problem, I searched for and collected existing big ideas that might be useful. Let’s us first look at the current solution of Google Maps for directions using public transits:
After the showing public transit information, the walking directions are only shown as street names that appear on the map. From the five whys and user interview, we know this is problematic because:
- Users don’t know which direction is north, left, or right.
- Users are dependent on the map and street names, which are not always available at the public transit exit.
- It would be hard for users to minimize looking at their phones.
Now, let us look at other solutions from Google Maps and another navigation app called Komoot.
AR Live View
The Live View AR feature of Google Maps uses landmarks to help users orient themselves when they are lost by providing visualizations of the directions and destinations in the real world. The landmarks are supposed to be iconic and easily recognizable places.
Pros: Helps users understand their surroundings and identify which street they are on.
Cons: The landmarks may not be well-known to everyone (imagine tourists new to Berlin). Moreover, the user interviews suggest that some users don’t feel comfortable using this feature because they don’t want to give Google Maps access to their camera nor do they want to hold their phones out to point at their surroundings in public.
Street View Steps
The walking option of Google Maps provide step-by-step directions from point A to B. Some steps include street views.
Pros: Provides an overview of the steps, street names, and visualizations of the streets and destinations.
Cons: Street views are not updated and users need extra time to click on street view and analyze where they are.
Komoot — Waypoints
During the user interviews, I discovered that 55% of the users use Komoot to navigate regularly for outdoor activities such as hiking and cycling.
For a route, Komoot provides Waypoints, which are intermediate points of landmarks that users can stop by on the way. The directions include photos and comments provided from the community.
Pros: The photos of the landmarks are clear and up-to-date and the users don’t need to rely on street names.
Cons: Introducing a similar community-driven feature could make the app bloated and cause breaking changes.
Remix & Improve
Other than Komoot, I also looked at the a local public transit app for Berlin called BVG and another well-known navigation app called Waze. I sketched the big ideas from existing solutions of each of these apps:
The Decision
Based on the HMW questions, I decided that a combination of the step-by-step directions and Komoot’s waypoints could be a viable feature to introduce at the target moment of the Sprint, where the users first look at the route information because:
- The visualizations of the waypoints will provide obvious indicators of where to turn after leaving the public transit.
- Since 90% of the information processed by the brain is visual, the visualization of the waypoints may help make the directions more memorable, thus reducing the need for the users to check the directions repeatedly.
Crazy Eights
Based on my decision, I set a timer for eight minute to create eight solution sketches:
At first I thought about using Google’s 360° street view as the visualization of the intermediate points. However, street views are not available for all the streets and are not all up-to-date (the street view of my apartment is a construction sight). I was stuck for a few minutes, then I remembered from the user interviews that some users contribute to Google Maps as local guides.
Google Maps is both business and community-driven since businesses have to register with Google in order to appear on Maps and users can contribute photos and reviews to the businesses.
After further investigation, I noticed that many businesses already have photos of the entrance of their locations. Adding another option for users to add photos of the “Outside” view would require minimal engineering efforts. Google can also require businesses to add a photo of the entrance.
From my investigation, I decided to use photos from Google businesses as the intermediate points because they can be sorted and selected based on the upload date to get the most recent photos and if they don’t exist they can easily be added to be business by the community.
Solution Sketch
After gathering all my ideas, I made a low-fidelity solution sketch of the user flow:
How to pick the waypoints?
For every street in the step-by-step directions, I decided to pick one waypoint to keep the users on track. I considered several ways to choose the waypoints:
- Pick businesses with the most recent photo
- Pick businesses with the most reviews
- Pick businesses with the most recent reviews
- Pick businesses based on personalization
- Allow the users to choose
This is an important question to address for the next iteration of the Sprint and would require more user research and testing. For the sake of rapid prototyping and testing, I used random waypoints in this project.
Storyboard
Next, I created a storyboard of a scenario to use for prototyping and user testing. The story:
Two friends are visiting Berlin for the first time and they are tired from a day of walking and want to grab a snack at a deli. They take the subway and once they leave the station they see the first waypoint and found the right direction to the deli.
Days 2 & 3 Summary: analyzed and remixed current ideas to come up with a solution sketch and created a storyboard for prototyping a user scenario.
Day 4 & 5 — Prototype and User Testing
Entry Point
I first explored different entry points for users to discover the new waypoints feature:
I was deciding between an accordion dropdown toggle (Options A & B) or a button (Option C). I chose the accordion toggle because it is a common design pattern to let users know that they can easily show and hide the underlying information. However, the current shortcut to the map is also an arrow, which might confuse the users. Therefore, I picked Option B so that users can both distinguish the new waypoint feature and have a shortcut to the map.
Testing
Due to the nature of the problem, the user needs to be physically present to test the prototype. I only recruited one expat friend in Berlin who uses public transits regularly to test the prototype because of COVID.
I made sure beforehand that she has never been to the destination before and is unfamiliar with the neighborhood of the subway exit. To my surprise my friend didn’t notice the new feature at first. It wasn’t until I asked: “Do you notice anything different?” that she clicked on the “Show Maps” button and noticed the waypoints on the map.
After finding the “Show Steps” toggle, even though my friend was excited and immediately saw the first waypoint from a distance after leaving the subway station, she was confused and wondered where the waypoints came from and wished that they were personal recommendations.
I also learned that only the waypoints at the street corners were helpful and if they are in the middle of the street, then they would be hard to spot.
Here are some other feedback from user testing:
“The first point was helpful because even if the direction says north, I don’t know which direction is north! So, having the picture really helped me!”
“It helps me feel more confident because I know where I am going and don’t need to remember the street names.”
“It allows me to enjoy the city more.”
“I feel like this feature does so much more than show steps.”
Going back to the Sprint questions, the results from user testing suggest that the new feature was able to help users find their destinations easier and faster, make where to turn more obvious and memorable. However, it was not easily discoverable.
I suspected that the accordion dropdown toggle and the copy caused the problem because of the small grey font size. Therefore, I made some changes to arrive at the final prototype.
Final Prototype
Days 4 & 5 Summary: determined an entry point for the prototype and adjusted the prototype after user testing.
Reflection
I was impressed by how much the user interviews helped me to focus on specific parts of the problem and gave me inspirations to come up with a cool solution.
I was also surprised by the user’s thoughts and feelings during user testing, especially when the user told me the new feature can do so much more than “Show steps” and suggested that I rethink the wording.
Overall, I am pleasantly surprised by the analytical aspects to design and taking into consideration of the users’ needs to create features that are can make their lives easier. Moreover, Design Sprints are absolutely effective to test out new ideas in a short amount of time — I tested out both my Google Maps feature concept and my career change ideas!
Next Steps
I am excited to learn more about UX design and I would like to incorporate feedback from the user testing to improve the prototype by:
- Researching and testing the copy to use for the entry point
- Providing information so that users know where the waypoints came from
- Researching and testing out how many points are needed to be most helpful (find out the waypoints/distance ratio)
- Conducting more user interviews and testing to find out if people want personalized waypoints or if they want to choose the points themselves
- Find out if the waypoints feature can be adapted to other modalities e.g. driving, cycling
