—
Applications
IoT device, iOS, Android
—
My Role
• user research
• prototyping
• UX
• UI
—
Challenge
How can we reduce confusion and mistakes from users when learning how to use the device?
—
What is it?
The gpskin Barrier is a bluetooth, medical-grade skin measurement device that reads how healthy the epidermis is.
—
The Problem
Users are not aware of the best practices of using the device. This leads to data that is questionable in quality.
—
The Goal
To increase the percentage of users using the device the correct the first time.
—
Building Empathy
Note: This product was developed before I began working on this project. So, although a product already in place, there was still plenty of observing, note-taking, and user-testing to accomplish to inform future firmware and software iterations with the hardware product.
Conferences
Exhibiting at an event is a fantastic way to get a lot of fast and free user tests done. We observed intuitive user habits for everyone who had never interacted with our device before.
One-on-one Interviews
With an understanding of our target audience, we recruited users in that demographic to come into our office and perform various tasks. We would do our best to understand our users needs, test for usability, ask for feedback, and gather first impressions.
—
User Testing
Discovery #1
When users first interact with the device, their first thing they do is try pressing the button. They hold it, click it, double click it - they play with it. One click turns the device on, so once this happens, users often continue to play with it by putting it to their skin, or pressing the button again, expecting a reaction from the device.
Discovery 2
When users are connected to the app and ready to measure, the natural method in which they measure with the device is by sticking it to their skin and then pressing the device button, or what we called, Stick and Click. There were also users who would hold the button to initiate a measurement, or Stick and Hold. However, the correct method to measure is by clicking the device right before applying it to the skin, or Click and Stick. Not a single user intuitively measured this way.
—
Solution
Based on our observations of the way users interacted with our device, we began to iterate on ideas that would help steer our users in the right way to use our device the correct way.
Print/Packaging
The first step to educating users on best practices is allowing them to face a set of instructions as the first thing they see when opening the box to the device. This instruction notifies them that in order for the device to work, they have to first turn the phone bluetooth on, download the app, sign up and log in.
App
Once users begin to follow the set of instructions, we ask them if they have a device in the sign up phase. If a user answers yes, we guide them to a tutorial on best practices for device use. If no, we save it for later until the app recognizes a connected device for the first time.
Pop Up Notification
Another feature we added was to allow the app to detect a connected device at anytime. Similar to an iPhone detecting a set of AirPods, if the phone detects a device, the gpskin App will prompt the user to ask if he/she would like to measure (and if for the first time, go through a how-to tutorial).
