Ndigi Gichingiri Presents
Boundary Awareness
In-app training that equips pet parents with the knowledge needed to effectively train their dogs to stay inside a wireless fence.
Background
Historically, dog escapes from wireless fences have been an issue for PetSafe Brands and the industry as a whole, but even more so for the pet parents who place their trust in our products.
Our Category Managers wanted to ship in-app training following the launch of an unreleased wireless fence in an effort to improve customer satisfaction, and to maintain our position as a leader in an increasingly competitive landscape.
My Role
I led this project and interviewed stakeholders, created wireframes & prototypes, collaborated with our copywriters, and facilitated, usability tests and user interviews.
The Problem
Lack of engagement with our print-based training guide leads to insufficient wireless fence training and dog escapes.
The Solution
An in-app training experience that equips pet parents with the knowledge needed to effectively train their dogs in a digestible format.
The Process
How We Revamped our Training Guide for an App
Over the course of nearly 2 years we conducted research and diligently ideated on potential solutions we tested Figma prototypes with dog owners and their pets.
We investigated root causes, and ultimately determined that our content needed a diet.
Considering most people don't read manuals it was immediately apparent that the long line length of our guide was likely one of the culprits leading to low training compliance.
We distilled key info from the training guide.
This greatly helped us determine what info was crucial for success, but one question remained, how could we make training more engaging?
As we started to work on screens we realized progress tracking and engagement shouldn't be at the expense of pets.
While we wanted training to be a somewhat fun activity, we made a conscious decision to avoid any progression frameworks that displayed completion rates or relied on gamification to increase engagement. Our primary goal was for pet parents to focus on correct behaviors instead of completing a set number of training sessions or tallying up points as they train.
Gamification was largely shot down because even though the shock our fences use is supposed to be relatively harmless, the idea of making a game out of this seemed highly unethical. In addition, even if we solved that issue it would've been too much of a lift for our development team.
Testing revealed a single page layout was not a viable solution.
While in-app training wasn't part of MVP for our new wireless fence, desire to launch them as a package started to grow so I paired down the experience as much as possible. Quickly we found that this format created confusion and caused participants to miss vital information.
Seeing as a bona fide in-app training program would require substantial effort we recommended holding off on this feature until higher priority projects were completed and we could do this justice.
Additionally, recognizing training could grow into a bigger offering for all of our other categories we recommended that training become it's own section in My PetSafe so that it could scale without being constrained to a specific containment product.
After a few months the project resumed and we continued prototyping and testing.
With the insights we got from our prior round of testing we knew a single page format was no longer an option.
Final Designs
A Streamlined Experience
Following our last round of testing it was clear we were on the right path but there was still room for improvement. Overall our content needed to be short, actionable, and relevant. On top of that users needed stronger examples of what success looks like so that they knew when they were ready to move on to the next stage in training. With these ideas in mind we created the final version of our new training program.
Behavior As Your Guide
During our last round of testing we heard participants express the need for some sort of indicator letting them know when their pet was done with the current stage.
Simple Steps
Time and time again we saw how large amounts of info diminished memory recall. This led us towards focusing on the core task at hand and relaying the minimum amount of info needed to complete it.
The Outcome
We validated that we were on the right track but unfortunately that was the end.
During our final round of testing we discovered that among our 6 participants:
- 66% gave the experience a favorable rating (4 or 5 out of 5).
- 66% felt confident about continuing to train their pet.
- 50% needed some sort of signal indicating when their pet was ready for their next lesson.
Using what we learned, we made some more revisions but the team working on our new wireless fence discovered a showstopping bug that has indefinitely delayed the release of our wireless fence and this experience.
Reflection Time
Closing Thoughts
This was my first major project at RSC and while I would have never expected it to take as long as it did, I'm extremely proud of all the work that went into it.
What I Learned
- It takes a village. In addition to Gloria, Casey, and Hank, many other hands touched this project in one way or another from participating in whiteboarding sessions to taking notes and recording our testing.
- Lead by example. Gloria, Casey, and Hank were all very accustomed to writing blog posts and content for product display pages so writing short copy was not only a big context switch from their day-to-day but also a skill they hadn't honed. This prompted me to write examples illustrating what I was looking for and ultimately made all of us better writers.
- Not everything needs to be in an app. While an in-app experience was a requirement I wish we would've spent some time investigating potential print based solutions, especially considering once a pet parent is done with the training period they likely wouldn't need this feature anymore.
What I Would Do Next
- More testing. There are 4 stages in training and throughout this project we heavily focused on validating the first one because it was crucial that we get the foundation right. To ensure that our approach to training works we would need to test our program in its entirety and address any potential issues.
- Image Enhancements. Mainly removing the blob shaped mask around our images (a mainstay in our design language) to create a better sense of symmetry. Additionally, I would like to work with our media team to get updated imagery as there were some instructions we didn't have any visual references for.
Two More Things
- I am proud to say no animals were harmed in the making of this product!
- I hate that I used the word "content" in this case study because the contentification of everything drives me insane but that's a topic for another time.