Project Overview
Lyft, amongst Uber, Curb, Gett, Juno and other ride sharing apps, have been revolutionary and impactful throughout our communities. It has provided a safe and quick alternative to the traditional taxi cabs for passengers but most importantly, it has provided economic opportunity for drivers. This concept allowed me to not only view the app from a consumer perspective but also as a producer and contributor to the application. After graduating from college, I had a few months before starting my full-time position over in San Francisco. I decided that driving Lyft for the time being would be a great idea to not only pass time but to make some money. Little did I know how much this application would change my life for the better. After a few months of driving for Lyft, I noticed that the experience was great but it could have been better. From this experience, I decided to rethink the drivers platform.
Roles: User Researcher, Designer, Strategist | Duration: 2 months
User research methods
Personal Experience
Having the ability to step into the users shoes is crucial when trying to get better understanding of what the user is truly missing. This experience was both humbling and informative because I really was able to understand and see for my own eyes the struggles that drivers go through on a daily basis. I wounded up driving for 5+ months, in which I picked up over 600+ passengers during the time. From my experience, I managed to gain insight on passenger and driver interactions, which shaped my project tremendously.
Conversations with passengers from around the country
Although my experience as a Lyft driver could have easily provided me with enough insight to propose various solutions to the problems I encountered, I didn’t want my research to be weighted only on my perspective. I wanted to gain insight from people around the nation because I knew that the experience of an inner city driver would be totally different than the experience of a driver in rural Oregon. This lead me to have conversations with various drivers from California, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Florida, New Jersey, and various other states from around the country. Here are some insights I gained from the conversations:
“I use Lyft after work for some extra cash and it’s great money but it all depends on how consistent my rides are during the day. It’s always frustrating when I have to wait for more than 30 minutes to have a ride sent to my Lyft app. I usually end up being discouraged in the process and I end up turning off the app.”
4th year Accounting & Finance Student, Experience: 1 year driving for Lyft
“I love the destination feature because I can just set it on my way home or to an event I’m going to. Sometimes I pick up a passenger on the way and I end up being late to my scheduled event. It’s never easy trying to explain to my girlfriend that I was late to her best friend’s birthday brunch because I had to drop someone off on my way to the place.”
Full-time driver, Experience: 3+ years driving for Lyft
“I battle with so much traffic in the greater Los Angeles area everyday. I know it’s part of the challenges of driving Lyft in a congested area but I just wish that there was more information on how to navigate to the best areas with less traffic and more demand.”
Retiree + Full-time driver, Experience: 2 years driving for Lyft
“I see a bunch of power zones but they aren’t really my priority. From my experience, the consistency of the rides are better when I take my own route. I just feel like every time I drive to power zones, I’m wasting my time and energy.”
IT professional +Part-time driver, Experience: 1 year driving Lyft
“As a women, it’s always challenging to take on a role as a Lyft driver. I often receive harassment from my passengers and its made me drive less because of that reason. I’ve been able to manage it because I’m in a time of need but I just wish there was a way to contact someone if something happens to me while on a ride.”
Full-Time Driver, Experience: 3+ years driving for Lyft
Key Takeaways
Throughout my user interviews, I noticed that drivers don’t really feel a sense of guidance when out on the road. This often results in them losing time in traffic or in areas where the demand is not high, leading them to turning off the application for the day.
The consistency of ride requests sent to a drivers app has a clear correlation with the amount of engagement the driver has with the application. In other words, drivers are using the application more if there is a steady flow of rides being requested to their app during the day.
Many drivers tend to ignore power zones, mainly because they don’t trust the information provided by Lyft. Drivers expressed that they believe the information is inaccurate, which leads them to ignore Lyft’s suggestions and take their own route.
Safety was a concern for most of the drivers I interviewed. This lead to many drivers avoiding driving during late afternoon and early morning hours. Consequently, this significantly cut down their driving hours with Lyft.
Formulating a direction
To guide my design process, I decided to organize my data in an affinity diagram, based on the questions I asked the drivers and their respective responses.
Once I analyzed my data, I discovered clear pain points that drivers face when driving in their respective regions.
After figuring out clear pain points of the drivers, I framed each pain point as a question starting with “How can we?” Framing the pain points as questions allowed me to get a better understanding on what solutions will be best for each pain point.
Once I framed the pain points as questions, I came up with the a few solutions for the the pain points I discovered during my research.
A user-centered focus
To further guide my design process, I decided to create two user personas that are based off the data from my research.
Strategy
How can Lyft form a stronger relationship with drivers?
I believe that asking this question is crucial for tackling the issues I found in my research. By Lyft forming a stronger and transparent relationship with drivers, drivers will feel more safe and appreciated, leading them to be more engaged and active in the Lyft drivers app.
After brainstorming the data that I obtained from my research and putting some thought to the question above, I came up with three principles that helped guide me during my design process:
Initial Sketches + Wireframe
While formulating potential solutions, I kept a few things in mind before coming up with actual designs. I wanted to build solutions that were feasible to implement into Lyft’s application and be able to incorporate it into existing features to provide an overall cohesive feel to the application. Here are a few images of my initial sketches:
I transferred over my wireframes into digital format to provide a better example of my proposed solutions. I’ve also broken down each screen and explained the new features in detail.
You can find the overview below:
Flow + Screen Overview
01 . “POWERZONE” GUIDE
Guidance
The “POWERZONE” guide feature allows the driver to gain a comprehensive overview of all the power zones near them for the day. This will act as a guide and a recommendation on where the driver should drive to earn more. When they turn on the app, a powerzone guide will appear on the screen.
Discover
Once the driver taps “Discover”, a screen will appear that will state the current zones and the upcoming zones for the day. The driver will be able to see where the powerzone is, its percentage, the estimated amount of traffic in the power zone area, and the estimated time of arrival to the power zone. They will then be able to press drive and Lyft’s application will set the driver into destination mode towards the powerzone.
Driver-Destination Mode
It will allow the driver to get to where they need to be to earn more but to also earn more on the way to the power zone. This will ensure that the driver will have a higher chance of receiving consistent rides during the day and to also earn more during their work hours.
02 . Lyft Help Center
Access to Assitance
Lyft Help Center is a feature that allows a driver to quickly contact someone in case of an emergency. The Lyft Help Center consists of three tabs: Lyft Representative, Roadside Assistance, and Call 911.
Dashboard
Lyft Representative will allow a driver to contact a representative for any issues pertaining to the ride. The roadside assistance tab will allow the driver to quickly contact their roadside assistance service while on a ride. Lastly, the 911 tab will be used to quickly contact the police in case of an emergency on a ride.
Emergency Contact
Not only will it contact the police but it will also send a text message to the person that is listed under emergency contact, stating that you have alerted the police while on a ride.
03 . Planner
Organize your schedule
Need to make it to your personal gathering on time? Instead of the scheduled pickup tab, I created a feature called Planner. This feature provides an opportunity to compile your scheduled pickups and your personal scheduled events for an overall cohesive overview of your schedule.
Add Events
For example, if a driver needs to attend an event, they can input the the information in the planner feature and Lyft will alert the driver while they are on driver mode.
Reminder Alert
Once the alert pops up on the screen, the driver will be able to press “Drive” and Lyft will set the driver to destination mode towards the scheduled event.