Find my pet

A start-up company has developed a pet collar that features a small GPS tag which continually transmits its location.

My role in this project was to map out system that would allow pet owners to locate wayward pets that have run off and so reduce the amount of time in their search process whilst giving them a positive experience when doing so.

Knowing that your pet might be lost is overwhelming

Understanding the context is key here and I wanted to find out the concerns owners were facing when their beloved pet would go missing so I conducted interviews with people who currently own one or several pets, those who recently adopted one and first-time pet owners.

I also wanted to find out from owners who have lost their pets in the last few months what their approach and methods were when searching for their pet.

I mapped out an empathy map and laid out all the different tasks they do as well as their own feelings towards such a situation.

Pet owners go through a lot of negative feelings and pains as soon as they find out that their pet is lost or has wandered off. They would do whatever it takes to find it, even if it means spending money to hire a pet detective or spending long hours with pet services. Though, they often feel hopeless as they have to rely on other people and simply putting flyers up is rarely successful.

Pets are unpredictable

“My 2 year-old dog managed to push open the wooden gate in the back garden. Just enough to squeeze through and escape”

Janine, 34

Photographer
First time pet owner

Home situation

Lives in a maisonette
Access to back garden

Her pet

Luna, 2 year old
Full of energy
Unpredictable

Luna loves going for a walk. Every time she hears me grabbing the keys, she knows it’s time to go out and gets very agitated!

She can be very unpredictable too. There was this one time when we took her to my grandma that we thought Luna was lost forever. She managed to escape through the wooden gate in the back garden after we forgot to lock it.

After spending the weekend calling pet shelters, putting flyers up and searching for her in the entire neighbourhood, we eventually manage to find her.

Someone saw her in a playground, scared to death! Luckily she was microchipped so the local pet shelter was able to contact us easily.

Main issue

All owners are fond of their pets and all are worry about their safety. Though, it is hard to keep an eye on them at all time.

“Animals behaves with instinct which is out of the human control.”

The main issue with our primary persona is not so much about the pet being gone but more the effort and time it took to find her dog, and the negative feelings towards this situation.

She needs her search to be done more efficiently.

Top goals

Keep my dog safe
Find it more efficiently
Track my dog whereabouts
Avoid stressful situations

Better prevent than cure

“Let your pet out and let Find My Pet do the search job for you.”

Research indicates that it would take an average of 3 days to find a lost pet through a traditional search and to better understand that process, I mapped out the journey owners would go through without a system such as Find my Pet.

What we found out is that the main problem owners face is that they have to rely on other people which makes their search uncertain and painfully long.

Find my Pet considerably cuts the journey down to a few clicks, giving owners total control of their search and giving them a better experience.

A clean and simple design

From the research, we understand that there's a need for a mobile application. I've defined the design to be simple with no clutter.

Logo

I created a flat logo using text and icons. The paw icons represent the journey to the target.

Less is more

I chose a bold flat purple colour palette and geometry patterns for the background. It's a colour that would stand out amongst all apps displayed on the user mobile, and therefore easy to locate.

It’s a clean and straightforward design. The login box stands out from the background and ask for minimal personal information.

Icons

Icons are essentials in this system. They guide the users navigate through the functions without being in the way of the main task.

Choosing a familiar interface for easy navigation

We know that owners’ primary issue is the amount of time they waste in searching for their lost pet so it was essential that the design of the app was using a layout and functionalities that they are already familiar with.

According to recent research, Google Maps […] is the most popular navigation app by a wide margin. It is the preferred navigation app for nearly 6x more people compared to the second-most popular app Waze […]. Source.

I designed this simple and self-explanatory navigation map.

From this prototype

Users land directly on the map but have access to the main menu at all time.

To this design

Pet owners can now locate their pet in just one click. The app also gives directions and transport options giving users the possibility to look at the fastest way to get to the destination.

From physical to digital

Before the app can locate the pet, it will first need to be synched to the dog collar.

I designed a side bar menu from where users are able to scan the QR code on the collar with their phone camera. Once the activate, users see the saved pet profile in the side menu and add more profiles, should they wish to.

Further developments

Pet owners who have experienced losing their pet in the past will particularly would gladly welcome a system like this.

Find my Pet is more than a support app to a trackable collar, it gives comfort to owners giving them a much nicer experience towards such situation.

We can suggest further improvements to the system such as:

Enabling the collar to be lighted up from the app so pets could be located in the dark.
Export statistic about the pets’ whereabouts.

All designs by me Tools: Photoshop, Illustrator, Sketch 3, Overflow

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