Problem Statement
In today’s landscape of food tourism, navigating the plethora of restaurant options online presents a daunting challenge. With an overflow of restaurant information and advertisements, it is challenging to filter and pinpoint the perfect dining endeavor that completes a traveler’s experience.
<I have single-handedly executed this project by myself.>
“More than half of the reason we travel
is that we can have the culinary experience."
— Zulueta, 2020
My solution for this problem is to introduce Savor,
a mobile application for those with great taste.
Savor analyzes user data and digital footprint to discover user’s preferences and favorites to curate the perfect restaurant recommendations to his or her liking.
Users & Audience
The target users of Savor are any of those who are looking to travel for the for the perfect dining experience. These users are highly engaged in digital activities such as posting on social media, subscribing to email listings, and purchasing items online.
Timeline
I conducted user research, information mapping, prototyping, and designing the user interface within a span of 10 weeks.
Problem Solving Process
User Research and Problem Identification
To gain a deeper understanding of user behaviors and needs, I have conducted 30-minute interviews with 7 interviewees located around the world. The reason I chose interviewees from different cultures is that I wanted to receive a variety of insights from diverse perspectives and backgrounds. The one specific requirement was that the participant travels internationally more than once a year.
Survey Question Examples
To synthesize my research, I have produced several visual artifacts such as the Mind Map, Affinity Map, Empathy Map, and a Journey Map based on a persona.
Mind Map
With the interview materials, I have created a mind map to capture themes and define why what and hows for each interviews.
Affinity Map and Empathy Map
After transcribing the interviews, I reframed the data into structured categories to see what connections emerge. The affinity map below shows the sorted and clustered data derived from interviews. The top pink post-its are the themes for each column and below yellow post-its are some research quotes or pain points from the interviews. From this data, I was also able to create an empathy map to illustrate what my chosen audience says, thinks, does, and feels. The black text is positive or neutral and the red text is negative points.
Interesting Insights
Most participants claimed that they would like to experience at least one high-end restaurant on a trip:
The dining experience was a big part of a travel experience for most participants and even with covid, it seemed like some are still putting dining as a top priority.
Some participants refer to multiple different sources when retrieving recommendations about a destination:
Everyone wants to have the best experience while traveling but gathering numerous amount of information is time-consuming and exhausting.
Most participants believe that the location is one of the most important factors when deciding where to dine:
As much as the eatery is the foremost priority, where the restaurant is located at influenced the decision making.
Needs
Restaurant selection comes first then comes the destination.
Depending on the dining experience, users will be deciding on where they will be traveling to. This is a reverse way of determining a travel destination compared to the traditional way. For big “foodies,” this can be an interesting way of deciding a location.
A personalized restaurant curation.
Machine learning program can curate a list of restaurant recommendations based on the user’s digital footprint. Linking to social media apps or email accounts can provide users with the most precise results. No need to go through numerous website or travel apps only to be disappointed by the reality from the photos you saw.
Search and reserve in one go.
With the carefully selected options in a list, you can also make reservations for the international restaurants without any hassle of going through a 3rd party site.
Understanding the Persona
Based on the research materials, I created a persona that represents the interview respondents as a whole. Understanding of this persona will be useful to improve the user experience.
Say hi to Olivia!
Olivia’s Journey
After establishing the persona, I created a journey map for Olivia to visualize the end to end journey of her customer experience. By understanding her highs and lows, I was able to find out her needs and possible solution for the problem.
Sitemaps
This hierarchial diagram shows tasks grouped into functionality buckets, which illustrates how my persona will use the content. From creating this sitemap, I was able to cut down any excessive opportunities or functions that may not be crucial for this concept.
Sketching
After understanding the problems and opportunities, I started sketching out different ideas for the possible solutions.
Wireframe and Annotations
Based on the main content and functionality of the platform, I created this low fidelity wireframe of my prototype that demonstrates the clarity of the flow and goal of the application.
Prototype
Please check out the Savor prototype here: https://www.figma.com/proto/eXcX3Ofejr9kNRB8qvIVcM/Savor-Wireframe?node-id=349%3A1939&scaling=scale-down
A Friendly Meet and Greet
Onboarding flow introduces the important functions of Savor that may be new to the users.
Really Getting to Know You
On top of the user data and footprint that the user provides, Savor offers optional questions for even more specific analysis to get to know the user in depth.
Easy Reservations Just for You
With the analyzed information, Savor recommends the carefully selected restaurants from all around the world that is perfect for the user’s taste and offers a straightforward and easy user interface to make reservations.
Learnings
To conclude, Savor is a useful product that can provide users with exactly the kind of restaurant they want to experience. The excitement of deciding the next vacation destination based on your dining choice is the unique concept for this product. The AI-powered user data analysis can save their time and cut down on any inconveniences that they go through while having to plan a trip.
