CLIENT: Shell Recharge Solutions
CHALLENGE: Do we need a Web experience for our EV drivers? What would it look like?
WHAT I DID: User interviews, Sketching & Prototyping, User Testing, Sprint Facilitation
WHEN: 2022 (Design Sprint, Fully remote)
OVERVIEW
Shell Recharge mobile app helps drivers of electric cars to find public charge points nearby, see real-time availability, view pricing, start a charge, and keep track of their charge session history. Plus, let's them manage their home charge point too.
GOALS
For User: As a driver who has recently leased an electric car I want the process of purchasing and installing my charge point to be intuitive and seamless, having the right information at the right moment and the right places.
For Business: As a business, we are trying to consolidate our app and web portfolio in order to offer the best digital experience for our customers. The products will be easier to maintain from a technical perspective and as an outcome we will increase customer satisfaction.
WE USED DESIGN SPRINT TO TACKLE THE PROBLEM
Wait, what's a design sprint?
Design sprints are a tried-and-tested process for answering critical business questions and de-risking strategic projects by bringing a diversity of views together and testing ideas with real customers. It's essentially the whole design process compacted into 5 days.
MONDAY
Understanding the problem
On Monday we focused with the team on building a shared understanding of the problem and opportunities for improvement. We did this by interviewing crucial internal stakeholders, ranging from product managers, hardware specialists, to technical, customer support, and sales agents. To hear the voice of the users, I have also interviewed customers representing different customer segments.
My role was to prepare the interview script and to lead the interviews, while the rest of the team was listening in. In total, we conducted 10 interviews for 30 minutes.
THURSDAY
Enough talking, time to prototype
On Thursday the rest of the team was ’off’ and I and another product designer I collaborated and started the day by creating a site map of the Web experience that we wanted to design
Who are we designing for?
Apart from understanding the problem and scoping it down, due to the limited time of 5 days we had available we also needed to decide on which type of driver persona should we focus on. We decided to focus on the lease driver, as this driver's journey is the most complex and for the business, it also represents the biggest user segment.
TUESDAY
Competitive benchmarking (but make it fun)
Now that we defined the driver persona and the part of the journey we would like to focus on, I wanted the team to expand their horizons when thinking about possible solutions, therefore I introduced the exercise of Lightning demos - each person in the team had to think of great web&mobile experiences that went well hand together covering different use cases and complementing each other. For this exercise, I prompted the team to also look outside the e-mobility industry. The result was lots of great examples that definitely inspired us and got our creative juices flowing regarding how can we apply certain aspects to our use case.
Alright, I'm inspired - bring in the paper!
Now that the team was feeling inspired it was time for the real fun - sketching storyboards. Each sprint participant sketched and presented their solution. After that, I asked the team to use dot voting on which specific parts of the solutions they thought we should make use of in the final solution.
WEDNESDAY
Decide for solution
Time for piercing the solution together. Having in mind the sketched ideas from the previous day, we have defined a specific user journey that we would like to test. In each step, we identified research questions we wanted to test on the last day. We would keep these questions in mind when designing the prototype:
Do users understand the concept of discount codes connected to their lease company?
In which step does an account registration make sense?
Does the web experience help users understand the steps and what to expect from buying the charge point to charging for the first time?
Does web or mobile make sense in each given step?
The Prototype
#1 Shell Recharge online e-commerce. The new concept of discount code helped us solve a technical challenge of seamlessly connecting lease company and the driver and quickly customising the offer on individual driver level.
#2 Order confirmed. We created a direct link to the new web experience where user can directly see their order. This prevents users from looking for necessary information in fragmented emails or overlooking crucial info in their spam box. It also prevents double account creation which was previously happening.
#3 New web experience. User can see the status of their order which was not possible before and we introduce more clarity in the process by breaking it down into visible steps.
#4 Users can now easily follow the installation steps of their charge point. We also added a section ‘while you wait’ to educate the user about charging. We opted for progressively sharing learning videos - always relevant to which step is user in.
#5 We added new functionality of the user being able to rate their installation experience. This will become an important business metric to measure satisfaction and ensure we work only with great installers.
#6 After the first charge sessions user will be able to see their charging overview on the Dashboard as well as the charge cards associated with their charge point
FRIDAY
Testing the prototype
The first hour of Friday I spent with putting together an interview script for the user testing later that day. Later, I tested the prototype with 5 customers representative of your user persona we chose. While I led the user testing, the rest of the team was taking notes. Putting our assumptions in front of customers challenged our understanding and unlocked a wealth of knowledge.
“I want to know more to give my account. I want to make sure it is secure and how it is going to be used.”
“Taking pictures with the phone would be easier”
“Reimbursement? What is that?”
“Would I use a charge card at home? I don't know”
Insights
Mobile experience leads, but there is a role for the web experience
Setting expectations and explaining ‘why’ is key to moving customers forward
We must provide guidance, reassurance, and handholding...
…but we must do it with a focus on simplicity and reducing cognitive load
Collaboration across functions/products and testing together is the way forward
Metrics
4/5
TASK SUCCESS RATE
3/5
USER SATISFACTION
5/5
APP ACTIVATION RATE