Timeline
1 month
Role
Sole Designer & Project manager, working directly with the client. UI/UX, Art direction, interaction design.
Tools
Sketch, After Effects
Challenge
How might we build an MVP for smart home app to introduce new features to customers and also help client to prepare for fund raising?
Year
2017
01
Understand
Context
Connect Home is a home automation service that produces smart home devices making regular home appliances smarter allowing users to control them and stay informed about what’s happening around their property even when they are away.
Discovery
Through 2 stakeholders interviews, 5 user interviews, market research & competitor analysis I made several important realizations:
Quick control - there can be dozens of devices in one room, there should be a way to quickly control whole groups or entire rooms.
Thermostat automation - new feature that is about to get supported on hardware level
Sensor data - Connect Home’s devices make any non-smart device smarter and continuously collect usage and status data.
02
Ideate
I started by creating the basic information architecture of the app and then proceeded to User Task Flows which served as text based wireframes that allowed for quick exploration. Then I continued to high fidelity wireframes detailing every screen.
03
Visual Design
References & Moodboard
I got inspiration from different products, both physical and digital. Among them were Apple Home, Nest thermostat, Pinterest and else. A couple mood boards were created to start shaping the visual style and communicating it to the client. Based on them I created first design concepts.
04
The app’s basic functionality is divided into several logical parts to make navigation easier. Thus, the tab bar panel includes Dashboard, Rooms, Devices, Scenarios (Automation), and Security sections.
Device Control
Smart custom interaction was designed for this project to ensure quick and easy control over devices. Devices can be controlled using force touch and long taps right from the main screen. It was inspired by similar interaction in Pinterest app.
Rooms
Rooms located in their own tab making it easy to navigate through devices located in different rooms of the house.
With the help of Contextual menu user can quickly control whole room, without going over every single devices all the time.
Thermostat
Gives access to a home’s climate control system. Users can switch on and off their heating and cooling systems as well as change the temperature. The Thermostat screen also shows statistics of temperature changes over a day, week, or month.
Thermostat Schedule
Setting schedule for the thermostat is pretty flexible as user can control it up to every hour.
Security
The Security screen allows users to observe their property by accumulating data from video cameras set up around their homes. Moreover, based on data from motion sensors, users get a diagram showing if there’s anybody inside their home.
Styleguide & UI Kit
At the finish line, the app style guide was created. It describes the visual style: color palette, fonts, text styles, and the components library.
The style guide and design mockups were handed off to developers with the help of Zeplin tool.
05
Funding raised
With this MVP design client was able to get investors interested and raised first round of funding
Successful launch
The app was launched soon after, providing crucial features to Connect Home customers
Positive User feedback
The app was well received by ConnectHome users as later customer satisfaction studies showed.
