Category: Design

Product review: Ola

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Does the world need another ride hailing app!? Ola, one of the many rivals of Uber, recently got a license to operate in London and are looking to take over from Uber as London no. 1 ride sharing service.

My quick summary of OIa before using it? I expect to see an app which looks and feels very similar to Uber.

How does Ola explain itself in the first minute? When searching for Ola’s app, in the iOS app store, if find an entry which says “Ola – Ride the change. Smart, safe rude hailing.” Wondering whether this strap-line refers to the safety issues that Uber has been plagued with in London and elsewhere, and whether Ola will use this as a main point of differentiation.

 

 

Once I’ve installed the Ola app on my phone, the opening screen doesn’t explain about what Ola is, but instead encourages me to join Ola in return for a £15 voucher.

 

Getting started with Ola? Getting started with Ola is painless and feels very similar to on-boarding many other apps. Call me a simpleton, but I do like the little animation at the end, which celebrates my completing Ola’s signup process and receiving a £5 voucher in the process. Hold on though, didn’t the opening screen of the app mention being able to receive vouchers up to £15!? What else do I need to do in order to get an additional £10 worth of vouchers?

 

 

 

Did Ola deliver on my initial expectations? Yes, from a digital experience point of view. Helped in a large part because the entire online on-boarding and ride-hailing feels so similar to that of Uber. I guess Ola isn’t necessarily trying to differentiate though its online experience but instead aiming to let the actual offline experience of using an Ola do the talking …

 

 

Product review: Getaround

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Getaround.com is a peer-to-peer car rental platform, headquartered in the US, which only recently came to my attention when it raised a $200m Series D funding round. I’m keen to better understand how Getaround is looking to change the ways in which we rent cars and how it differentiates itself from well established car rental companies such as Hertz and Avis:

My quick summary of Getaround before using it? – I expect a consumer driven car rental platform that gives people more flexibility with respect to renting a car when and where they want it.

 

 

How does Getaround explain itself in the first minute? – “Rent cars by the hour or day” it reads when I check Getaround’s UK site on my desktop, followed by “For moving into your new home.” Staying on the homepage for a few minutes, the secondary strap-line changes, highlighting the various use cases for Getaround, varying from “For surprising grandma on her birthday” to “For meeting a client, in time and in style”. I can’t see an obvious option for me to list my car for hire, which is surprising given that this is a peer-to-peer car rental platform.

Getting started with Getaround – I start my search by entering a location, a check-in date / time and a check-out date / time, and click “Search”:

 

 

 

What happens next? – The search generates 31 pages of vehicles for me to choose from. These results haven’t been filtered yet and the site offers a number of filters to apply in order to narrow down the search results.

 

 

Getaround’s filters feel pretty standard, but I’m curious what’s involved in self-service cars. Where do I pick those up? Or do they get dropped off at my exact location? What do I gain by selecting “Reserved parking”?

 

 

When I disable the “Self-service cars” filter, I can select the “instant booking” option which means that vehicles can be booked without waiting for confirmation from the owner.

 

 

I like how I can filter by “vehicle age”, presumably as a way of ensuring that I don’t hire an ancient car that might be more prone to engine failure or other issues. However, I’m not immediately clear what is meant by “acceptance rate”. Clicking on the tooltip clarifies this.

 

 

 

When I select a car, I land on a pretty intuitive but detailed product detail page. This page includes pictures of both the exterior and the interior of the car, information about where the car can be picked up and free mileage included. At this stage it still isn’t entirely clear to me how Getaround’s self service works, but I presume that I can go to the car at the location indicated and unlock the car with my phone (assuming this is a feature I can access via Getaround’s app once I’ve signed up and booked the car).

 

 

 

A quick check of the description of the Getaround app on the app store confirms my assumption around automatic unlocking the car via the app.

The page also includes customer reviews which I find particularly helpful here, given that I’ll be driving someone else’s car and would naturally be unsure about the condition of the car, responsiveness of the owner, etc.

 

 

More information about insurance and roadside cover is only a few clicks away, but I can’t help still feeling somewhat apprehensive about the ‘small print’.

 

 

 

It’s only when I click on the “book” call to action at the top of the page that I have to sign up for the service.

 

 

Did Getaround deliver on my initial expectations – Yes. The site felt intuitive whilst containing a good amount of detail. However, I wasn’t clear about the process involved in listing my car for hiring, and I felt that key parts of the experience – both online and offline – could be explained better.

 

 

 

Product Review: North

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Ever since I reviewed Warby Parker last year I’ve been intrigued by companies that aim to disrupt the experience of buying glasses. So when I heard about a company called North, my ears perked up and I decided to explore their product further:

My quick summary of North before using it – I expect a value proposition similar to Warby Parker, with North offering a simple way to discover and buy new glasses, perhaps a novel take on the “try before you buy” concept.

How does North explain itself in the first minute? – “Focals. Smart glasses that put fashion first” is the strap-line above the fold on the homepage of https://www.bynorth.com/. The combination of the word “smart” in this strap-line and the picture of a Google Glass like pair of glasses tells me that this site sells glasses that display information in a hands-free fashion.

 

 

When I scroll down the page, there is a further explanation of what “focals” are:

 

 

Getting started (1): Clicking on “Shop Focals” takes me to a product detail page, which includes a price point – starting at $599 – as well as styles and colours to choose from.

 

 

 

Getting started (2): “Premium holographic lenses” is the only bit of information on this page that I’m not sure about. It’s at this stage that I realise that I can’t buy the glasses online, but that I need to book a “custom sizing” appointment first.

 

 

Getting started (3): I decide to take a step back and learn more about Focals are. Clicking on “Focals” on the top navigation of the homepage takes me to a very useful “Explore Focals” page. I’ve never had a pair of Google glasses, but I don’ think they could be customised to the same extent that Focals can be tailored to the wearer’s needs.

 

 

Main learning point: I’m not yet convinced whether smart glasses will catch on. Perhaps the likes of North will make a difference, because their “focals” will look and feel like regular glasses. The customisation aspect of North’s product definitely resonates, and might just be the difference between North failing or being a runaway success.

 

Related links for further learning:

  1. https://www.bynorth.com/focals
  2. https://www.modernretail.co/startups/systemic-issue-the-customer-acquisition-challenges-dtc-brands-face-goes-beyond-cost/
  3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eO-Y36_t08
  4. https://www.digitaltrends.com/wearables/north-focals-news/

Product review: Range

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Braden Kowitz is a great product designer, having established his craft at Google and Google Ventures. He’s worked on products such as Gmail and with successful startups such as ClassPass. So when I heard about Range, the startup that Kowitz is a co-founder of, I was keen to learn more about the product.

My quick summary of Range before using it? I expect Range to be a tool that helps companies engage more effectively with their employees.

How does Range explain itself in the first minute? “Teamwork simplified” is the strap-line above the fold on Range’s homepage, explaining how “Range helps you stay in sync and feel like a team, so you can do your best work together.”

 

It looks like Range addresses three main areas of employee communications and engagement:

  1. Check-ins – Enabling teams to run virtual stand-ups on a daily basis.
  2. Objectives – Setting and monitoring of OKRs.
  3. Meetings – Helping people to run more effective meetings.

 

 

Scrolling down, the homepage explains how Range is all about team work, helping its users to feel like a true team – even if the team is distributed across multiple locations.

 

 

Getting started: After I’ve clicked on the “Try free” call to action on the homepage, I’m directed to the first step of an on-boarding flow. It’s good how Range assures me that I can sign up for an initial 30 day period, without a credit card being required. I need to sign up via a Google account and I can request a demo in case I don’t have a Google account. It would be good to understand why I can only sign up via my Google account.

 

 

I use my personal Gmail account, since we don’t use Google for work email, and I receive below error message which explains how “Range is meant for work”. I’ll request a personal walkthrough instead …

 

 

When I click on the “Request a demo” call to action, I’m directed to a standard sign-up page, which worries me that I’ll be receiving a lot of emails before and after my demo. It’s therefore reassuring that Range mentions “Don’t worry, we hate spam too.” Not sure though whether Range will be able to fulfil my demo request since we use Microsoft Outlook at work.

 

Did Range deliver on my expectations? Not yet. I hadn’t realised that Range only works if you’re a G Suite Google user. Ask me again after my personal Range walkthrough 🙂

 

 

App review: TikTok

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Lately, I’ve heard lots of good things about TikTok – which came out of Musical.ly, a hugely popular social media app – headquartered in Shanghai – that let you watch and create your own lip sync video to the music available on the app. I was familiar with Musical.ly but lost track somewhat after the company got acquired by Bytedance who merged the app with TikTok. Let’s have a look at the TikTok app:

My quick summary of TikTok before using it? I expect a highly interactive app, which lets users create and share their own music clips.

How does TikTok explain itself in the first minute? When I open the app, I see a quick succession of videos;  “Real Short On the job Videos”, “Real Short Art Videos” to “Real Short Weird Videos”.

 

 

What happens next? I swipe up on one of the videos I land on what looks likes a sample personalised “For You” news feed, with a standard overlay asking me whether I’d like to receive push notifications from TikTok. The feed does suggest it has been personalised for me, but I’m unsure what this is based on since I haven’t been on any on boarding journey where I, for example, started following other TikTok users or indicated my content preferences. Presumably, I’ll need to create a TikTok account first in order to be able to get tailored content and be able to create my own content.

 

 

 

What’s on boarding like? TikTok’s on boarding process is pretty straightforward: (1) it asks for my birthday (which won’t be shown publicly) (2) I can then sign up via my phone or email (3) set a password and (4) slide puzzle piece in the right place to make sure I’m not a bot.

 

Getting started – The first video in my personalised feed is a video from “cameronisscoooool” in which she shares her realisation who she is and describes herself as a “piece of sh*t”:

 

I realise straight away that I’m not the target audience for TikTok, which is totally cool – painful, but cool 🙂 Understanding how I can start either discovering new videos or creating my own is very simple; tapping on the “search” icon at the app’s bottom navigation displays trending content and tapping the black “plus” icon on the same bottom navigation.

 

 

Did TikTok deliver on my expectations? Yes. Based on my previous familiarity with musical.ly I was expecting just user generated music videos, but I like how TikTok has now broadened this out, combine music and video content.