CLIENT

Optus

MY ROLE

UX & Service Design

SUMMARY

Develop a blue sky thinking project for Optus considering 'Signature Experiences' including a number of 'WOW' touchpoints that will create positive engagement for Optus' 'Families' segment.

OUTCOME

'Safety Quest' was a concept that was developed as an educational platform for parents addressing the overarching theme of 'child safety'. Parents could use this platform to curate their child's gamified learning adventure regarding all aspects of safety, from being sun smart to stranger danger and online safety.

PROJECT GOAL

To understand the needs, behaviours and dynamics of a self-chosen customer segment, and to design a 'Signature Experience' that will create positive engagement for Optus' new and existing customers.

THE APPROACH

A cross-discipline human-centred design methodology was used to gain insight into the telecommunications space from the lens of customers across various touchpoints.

THE PROCESS

The Process of Design Squiggle by Damien Newman, thedesignsquiggle.com

Assumptions

Discover

Define

Develop

Deliver

Assumption mapping

Internal discussion guide

Research plan

Research plan

Desktop research

Discussion guide

User interviews

Industry analysis

Affinity mapping

Themes & insight development

Revised problem statement

Current state customer journey map

Ideation workshops

Concept cards

Focus groups

Initial sketches

Storyboarding

Usability testing

User feedback

Iterations

Hifi wireframes

Minimum viable product

ASSUMPTIONS

INITIAL RESEARCH

To better understand the customer segment as a team, we first developed an internal discussion guide. Individually, we mapped out six of our own memorable customer experiences and touch-points, three companies that delivered signature experiences, and six things that define the needs of a family from telco companies.

Combined with industry, consumer and government trend reports, this helped identify themes to progress with the research and interview discussion guide.

THEMES

• Coverage/network speed
• Customer service
• Personalisation
• Content

• Safety
• Devices
• Value and loyalty programs

DISCOVERY

INTERVIEWS

We structured a discussion guide with three proactive/reactive scenarios to ask for four sets of parent-child interviews to capture how the previous themes came into play in the family-home dynamic.

1. 'It's an average Saturday night at home. What is happening? What is everyone doing?'
   
2. 'It's that same Saturday night at home. The internet goes out, what happens?'
   
   
3. 'Your youngest child is old enough for a phone. What does that process look like?'

This gave us valuable insight into the family home and the relationship families have with technology and telco companies. 

THEMES

• Reasons for children having a phone
• Current service/s
• Device ecosystem
• Child-focused safety measures
• Shopping behaviours
• Frustrations with safety measures (parental controls)

• Tech literacy
• Household reward systems
• Account management
• Privacy concerns
• Customer service experience/s and
• Account perks/bundles

DEFINE

INSIGHTS - REFINED

After our first client check-in, they informed us that the research was too 'product' focused and asked us to revisit the research, removing the 'tech/telco' lens.

Stripping back the insights to the core needs, the following remained:

INSIGHTS

Time

Help parents to manage workloads/tasks to free up time for things that matter.

Safety

Reassure parents that their children are safe both online & offline.

Incentives

Assist in teaching children good values, behaviours, & future life skills.

Budget

Relieve financial pressure to free up resources for children's education and entertainment.

Quality Time

Enable more shared family experiences.

FINDINGS

Based on supplied personas and interview data, we developed a 'current-state, day-in-the-life' customer journey map capturing the family's highs, lows and opportunity areas.

We found that safety was a consistent underlying issue.

DEVELOP

THE APPROACH

Synthesized findings, insights and research were used to direct and inform ideation exercise workshops to generate ideas to help resolve participant pain points.

We used a storyboard approach to map out each concept into a story, consisting of multiple slides and scenes, giving context to each idea.

Using a focus group to test the concepts, we asked attendees to talk through each story, capturing their expectations, thoughts and opinions of the solution as a parent.

OUTCOMES

21 topline concepts generated addressing five insights

3 detailed concept boards created

3 concepts brought into the prototyping & testing stage

1 round of usability testing with various participants

CONCEPTS

Virtual Family Assistant

A device-agnostic virtual assistant that automatically collects information from connected devices and consolidates them in one family schedule with the ability to set reminders and assign/automate tasks.

Safety Quest

A parent-curated education platform delivered as an interactive game that teaches children personal safety (online & offline) and incentivises them with personalised rewards.

Life Skills Holiday Camp

A summer camp for kids to learn life skills and independence through fun-based interactive activities led by professionals in a safe, caring environment.

FINDINGS

• Parents don't like the idea of more technology in the home, especially if being used as a way to educate their children in place of a family conversation.
  
  
• Parents love the idea of building experiences for their children but want to join in or curate their child's learning journey.
  

DELIVER

THE RECOMMENDATION 

Safety Quest is a gamified learning platform for children, curated by parents.

Parents are able to build a curriculum they deem important for their child to learn about safety, with incentives embedded into the platform encouraging continual engagement.

Parent platform to curate learning paths

Transparency over child's learning

A gamified platform for children, distilling core lessons into fun and interactive learning

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