The GreenShare App: An App for Gardening Community

 
 
 
 

My Role

I conducted user research, then worked extensively on user product design and evaluation.

The steps I followed were:

  • Original Garden Illustrations
  • Product Definition
  • Research
  • Analysis
  • Ideation
  • Information Architecture
  • Evaluation
  • Iteration
 
 

The Problem

Most gardening apps focus on plant care and information, but for many people, gardening means so much more. People working and living at home during the pandemic turned to gardening for connection, pleasant routine, advice, and shared joy in a simple activity. I was one of those people–I shared onions I grew with the young couple next door and traded gardening tips with the former chef living across the street. We connected and grew our relationships along with our gardens during that time.

 
 
 
 

With life slowly returning to “normal” people (like me) may want to keep the same connection to neighbors and community. What would a gardening app look like that connected gardeners to each other and became an integral and important part of their gardening experience? The biggest design challenge during the GreenShare app design was paring down the app possibilities to three key functions:

  • trading produce
  • sharing plot designs
  • connecting with gardening friends
 
 
 
 

The solution

I adopted a user-centered workflow process to learn about the problem space, identify potential users’ wants and needs, and then prototype and test the design solutions.

 
 

Research

My first goal was to learn about gardeners and define the problem. First, I jumped into research mode to find out about gardeners-who they are and what they care about. Gardeners, it turns out, are social creatures and want to be a part of something bigger than themselves. I explored existing data to find out more about the problem space.

 
 

secondary Research

I combed through current research on community and gardening, including research on the social impact of community gardens in the Greater Cleveland area, Axiom’s (Minneapolis-based marketing company) 2021 Garden Survey. I also examined articles from The Wall Street Journal, Yale School of the Environment, The Guardian, and popular press gardening coverage.

I discovered key insights including:

 
 
 
 

Competitive Analysis

Once I covered existing gardening research, I compared and analyzed popular gardening apps to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses using heuristic analysis. Three apps were evaluated using heuristics from Nelson’s Ten Heuristic Principles including:

  • Match between System and the Real World
  • Aesthetic and Minimalistic Design
  • User Control and Freedom

If I had had more time, I would have used all 10 principals to evaluate the gardening apps. Time constraints only allowed for the analysis of 3 principals. Below is a sample of an analysis I conducted of the Heuristic principle Match between System and the Real World with the gardening apps Garden Tags and Gardenize. The principle looks for apps to follow real-world conventions, to make information appear in a natural and logical way.

 
 
 
 
 

Primary Research

Once I had examined existing gardening apps’ design and features, I conducted qualitative research to learn about potential users within the problem space. I wanted to learn more about the ideal customer. Who are the gardeners who will appreciate and use the app?

 
 
 
 

Surveys

I conducted a survey of the GreenShare App ideal customer–gardeners who use apps and the internet, currently have a garden, and live in various settings-rural, urban, and suburban. Survey responses indicated I was on to something: A majority of respondents showed an interest in either connecting to a gardening community or were already a part of a gardening community.

 
 
 
 
 

Interviews

After gaining an understanding of current market opinion, I wanted to learn first-hand about the ideal customer. I interviewed eight participants who gardened and used the internet and apps, and organized their question responses into an Affinity Map. I noticed the comments fell into several clear categories related to gardening:

  • Connection-a strong need to connect to people through gardening
  • Transaction and Value-an interest in sharing what they’ve grown with community
  • Improvement-a desire to become a better gardener, and to teach others
  • Environment-an awareness of the garden’s role in supporting nature and reuse
 
 
 

Going into this project, I had assumed gardeners would be interested in improving their gardens and learning what other gardeners were growing, but their responses included many other gardening reasons I hadn’t considered. For example, several respondents were interested in impacting the environment--growing pollinators, reusing plant waste, and so on. I also learned trading seeds and plants were huge joys and motivators for other gardeners.

 
 
 
 
 

Empathy Map

Using data from the surveys and interviews, I created empathy maps to sum up learning gained from the research. This allowed me to understand potential users’ needs while finding out more about the users themselves.

Gardener Pains:

  • Practical gardening concerns: Plant and bug issues, not enough sun, etc.
  • Knowledge silos: Wanting to share gardening details and goods, but not having great ways to pass on the information to others.

And Gardener Gains:

  • Life enhancement: Saving money, time, eating healthier, broadening home menu options
  • Community connection: helping others, sharing produce
 
 
 
 

User Personas

From the empathy map information, I created examples of typical gardener users: their goals, motivations, frustrations and interests. The user personas provide a connection with and understanding of the users (to empathize with the users) to know who they are and what they want. Rita “the Helper” and Jeff “the Maximer” were the resulting user personas.

 
 
 
 
 
 

Problem Statements

After a review of all quantitative and qualitative research data, I developed problem statements in the form of “How might we” (HMW) questions to determine the best approach for the gardening app design. HMW questions are questions that initiate the brainstorming phase. These questions need to be broad enough to encourage a range of solutions, but narrow enough to provide solution boundaries:

  • How might we help people find other gardeners in their community and connect them?
  • How might we make trading garden produce feel appealing and easy?
  • How might we support successful gardeners in sharing knowledge with others?

Forming these problem statements enabled me to focus my design efforts on solving users’ gardening issues and concerns.

 
 
 
 

Information Architecture

Now that I better understood the users and had my design approach in place, I needed to come up with a list of features to provide design solutions to user’s needs. I focused on how the users would move through the app and the different routes they might take to reach their goals, identifying potential design problems along the way.

MVP features

I identified a list of the app features needed to navigate the app successfully:

  • Users needed to be able to connect with friends, neighbors and family to share gardening information and photos. This included sending messages, uploading photos and information, and liking other posts.
  • They needed to be able to trade, sell or donate produce and plant products.
  • Users also needed to be able to share garden plot information, including plot diagrams, photos and written descriptions.
 

Site Map

With the necessary app features in mind, I created a site map (a visual representation of all of the different screens) to show how all the features would go together. I described the navigation and hierarchy of the GreenShare App and how the user transitions from one screen to another.

I divided the user paths into three categories: My Friends, My Plots and My Trades to show the three different app functions.

 
 

User Stories

I created user stories to show how users might navigate the app in their actual settings. This included determining what the user wants and experiences when using the app.

 
 
 
 

User Flows

After generating the site map and user stories, I designed a simple diagram outlining the steps a user takes with the app to reach a goal. This allowed me to quickly identify the effectiveness of the user’s process to accomplish a task. I narrowed the routes down to the essential ones–the red routes– a user might need to achieve their goals. These included routes for posting a plot design, posting an item to trade, and sharing a post with friends.

 
 
 

Ideation

Now that I understood the user’s process for achieving their goals using the app, I created sketches to visualize what the actual app screens might look like to accommodate reaching the user’s primary goals (the red routes).

 
 

Sketches

First, I created low fidelity paper prototype sketches of the red routes. I used the drawings to show how each screen might look in the process.

 
 
 

From the ordered sketches I designed an interactive low fidelity prototype and conducted guerilla usability testing with five users who fit the user profile to get immediate design feedback.

My main goals were:

  • to test the readability of my interface (did participants naturally know, at least partially, what to do for my red routes without being prompted?) the fluidity of the tasks-was it clear where to go? Was the purpose understood?
  • If I asked them to make a plant trade, upload a plot, post to their local circle, could they follow a logical sequence to do so?
 
 

Based on the findings, recommendations included:

  • a call out tutorial screen or short video tutorial to explain the purpose of each of the three many functions on the home screen
  • a rewording of “my profile” to “my uploads” to minimize confusion for users
  • adding filter options to each section to allow users to find local plant trades and plots.
  • Each three sections--trades, plots, and circles--needs to have a section expansion function so the user can focus on the section of interest, in addition to scrolling sideways for additional feed.
 
 
 

Wireframes

From the sketches (ideas) I then made a more accurate representation (but still lacking detail) of what the app screens would look like. The Low Fidelity Prototype was a more concrete example with content laid out on each screen for user interaction. Wireframe examples:

The GreenShare app welcome screen, login screen and home screen are shown below

 
 
 
 

Wireflows

From the wireframes, I created consecutive app wireframe screens to show places a user would press, swipe or otherwise interact with the app’s screens and buttons. Here’s an example of a wireflow of a user’s path to upload a plot image (garden design):

 
 
 

User Interface Design

Mood Board

Once the basic screen design and primary screens had been established, I created the app’s actual color and style aesthetic. This involved designing a mood board for the GreenShare App. I looked at several ideas for inspiration, and came up with earthy colors and tones to mimic the feel of the garden and nature.

 
 
 

Style Guide

In the same way, I explored several style options and chose a simple, readable font and element colors that reflected the natural world–earthy browns, greens, and blues. The style guide ensured the GreenShare app had a consistent look and feel.

 
 
 
 

High Fidelity Prototype

Once I decided on the app style guide and color scheme, I used Figma to design a more accurate app prototype based on the earlier user testing feedback. With the chosen design aesthetic in mind, I focused on an organic design feel. I used screen elements such as rounded corners, a soft, earthy toned color palette, and images that enhanced the app’s color palette and subject matter.

 
 
 
 

Usability Testing

Now that users could visualize a more polished version of the app, I conducted three in-person moderated usability tests and one remote moderated test with the high fidelity prototype. The user testing goals included:

  • determining the usability of common app tasks
  • discovering aspects of the app prototype that seem confusing and unclear to targeted users
  • learning user impressions of the main home screen page.

I was surprised to learn, for example, some users were confused by main app terms such as “circles” and “plots”. I had assumed labeling icons would be enough to make the terms clear and obvious.

 
 
 
 

Recommendations included onboarding term clarification and using descriptive photo samples to clue the user to the category meanings.

 
 
 
 
 

Iteration

Retesting, Usability Testing

I applied user feedback and retested the prototype again.

Overall User Feedback

  • Users described the GreenShare app as “Clean, Bright and Easy to Use”
  • Needs Clear Category Explanations and Button Navigation
  • Has User Appeal for Social and Practical Use
 
 

feedback

One user described the GreenShare app as:

 
 
 

This comment perfectly distills the app down to the three app user goals–social, commercial, and informational.

 
 

The GardenShare app: Final Thoughts

  • Through the multiple iterations and rounds of testing I learned to be as clear as possible from the very beginning of the design process.

  • User navigation confusion could have been avoided by improving app prototype transitions and functionality before testing, even in the early stages.

  • Moving forward, the GardenShare app needs further usability testing and finessing before bringing it to market.