Android development

Usability research for an android development learning platform. The objective was to extract learner’s current learning behaviours, industry roles and their respective implications on the product. The aim was also to furnish human-centered insights to evaluate and validate the actual value addition of the changes on the platform.

User cycle

Lead generation

Task

Platform to learn app business skills. Online training, designed by Google experts, for new and aspiring app makers.

Persona Mapping

Retention

Trustworthy source for learning compatible with Google Play
Providing bite-sized learning modules categorized on the basis of the app development stage
Troubleshooting videos in order to solve urgent needs in the simplest way

Remain up-to-date with the new rules and regulations of Google Play
Certifications add to the credibility of the developer
'Developer community' as an engagement platform to connect with like-minded developers and aid in peer-based learning

Acquisition

When did users interact with the platform based on the app development stage

Key questions

01

02

What are users’ and non-users’ motivations, expectations & experiences around :

The reorganisation of content via the introduction of course taxonomy
Is the content on the platform, overall, valuable and/or meaningful?
This includes insights regarding the change in the UI of courses.
Is there any content that is missing on the platform / they would like the platform to have?

03

Achieving an overall understanding of what drives the users (actually or potentially), if at all, to use the platform.

Do peer-based learning and the idea of a ‘developer community’ remain important levers to consider for this platform?

Methodology and participant profile

Details of the study

01 Usage & Value

02 Usability & Interventions

How do participants learn? To what extent does Rani contribute to their learning?

To what extent do users want to learn foundational skills in their apps and phones?

What preexisting mental models do users have in regards to trying the product?

Do users understand the premise of Rani?

How valuable do users find Rani?

Is Rani a good teacher? Does it help users get more out of their phones?

03 Content

Which content style helps users learn best? What content attributes work/don’t work and why?

How effectively can users utilize web stories (e.g. navigate, pause, unmute, etc)?

To what extent do users share learning content with friends, family and teachers?

To what extent do users prefer conversational/colloquial Hinglish in learning content vs Hindi or English only?

To what extent do practice and feedback help users better learn the content they watch?

How usable is the app and how can it be improved? Does the UI make sense?

Do users utilize categories to find content they want to learn about?

What entry points do users typically use to enter the app?

A global android development learning platform had collaborated to employ design-led and user-driven research approaches into product development and redesign. The aim was also to furnish human-centered insights to evaluate and validate the actual value addition of the changes on the learning platform. Keeping in mind research objectives of the study, team proposed conducting in-depth interviews (IDIs) with 4 entrepreneurs and startup owners.

The broad insights of the project showcased that:

The course taxonomy was appreciated for increasing accessibility to relevant content. It was perceived as a structured reorganization of the content on the platform to facilitate focussed learning.
Course content was liked for being concise and accessible. The recapitulation and check your knowledge sections at the end were appreciated as enabling and reviewing retention.
Peer-based learning and the idea of the developer community remained integral to this set of participants for both learning and troubleshooting such that they seek it from this particular android development learning platform as well.
Primarily, credible and up-to-date information about policies acted as a driver for using (and continuing to use) this particular learning platform.
Participants sought examples in the courses and human touchpoints (in the form of peer-based learning, developer community, expert interaction, preferably human-based and not animated videos) on the platform overall.

My role in the project was from end-to-end where I created assets for the study, conducted in-depth interviews, synthesised key takeaways along with final report writing.

My takeaways from the study have been:

While conducting the study, it became evident that in order to analyse the value proposition it was essential to define the user profiles in respect to expertise and learning expectations. This was because the learning patterns differed for all 4 profiles.
During the project, interesting learning was understanding the importance of creating tangible work-in-progress data. When relying only on discussions, team members may experience disagreements because of differences in their interpretations of each others’ vocabulary. However, design researchers inherently favour design, so find it beneficial to bring something written to a discussion or, better yet, a visualisation.
As a design researcher, I am supposed to be a question-askers by trade and hence learn the art of phrasing questions in the discussion with participant prompts to get to the root causes. I became even more proficient as I realised while everyone will ultimately be interested in discovering the why behind the issues, simply asking people "Why?" is the wrong approach.

Back