THE CHALLENGE

The North American parking industry is estimated at a whopping $36B, of which only 2% is currently digitized. In particular, the rising popularity of electric vehicles (EV) comes with a considerable set of challenges. While the EV market is projected to grow by 17% annually, few companies apart from Tesla house their own charging network. As a result, EV drivers struggle to easily find and park at an available charging location for the right price, at the right time, and at the right location.

As my capstone project for the Segal Design Certificate, I teamed up with SpotHero, the leading digital parking marketplace in North America with over 5M+ users, to explore ways they could tap into the rapidly growing EV market and become the central aggregator for all parking-related transactions. We asked:

How can we help SpotHero become the de facto charging marketplace for all charging integrations, powering EV drivers on the go and meeting them where they are? 🔋🚗

SHH… SNEAK PREVIEW 👀

CURRENT STATE ANALYSIS

So… why invest in EVs? 🔋

To understand if there was a valid market for us to design towards, we began our research with an analysis of the EV marketplace, which allowed us to explore the potential problem spaces SpotHero could tap into.

With the EV market expected to grow by 17% annually, we identified a lot of room for growth!

VALUE PROPOSITION

Before diving into design, we sought to understand how SpotHero might be uniquely positioned to pioneer the future of EV parking and charging.

At present, the EV market is extremely fragmented. While multiple automotive companies produce EVs, each one comes with a specific charger, without a central charging infrastructure used across the industry. As a result, EV owners face a lot of frustration when trying to find an available charging spot. 

USER RESEARCH

We surveyed 125 randomly selected EV drivers about their EV driving and parking habits to validate our project goals.

OUR MAJOR CUSTOMER PROFILES

Based on these insights, along with conversations we had with EV drivers, we defined the different types of SpotHero users in a myriad of circumstances, including the occasional user and vehicle fleets.

PRODUCT VISION

All in all, this led us to develop a specific product vision:

A comprehensive and centralized solution for users to reserve parking spots, pay for parking, and charge their EV all directly within the SpotHero app, saving time, hassle, and money.

LET'S IDEATE!

With a vision and target outcomes, we began breaking down the specifics of the user experience and mapping out where to intervene 📌

PROTOTYPING + ITERATING… THE CYCLE GOES ON

Given that we were mainly iterating within SpotHero’s existing user interface and design system instead of starting from scratch, we directly prototyped in high-fidelity.

Based on feedback received from internal developer design reviews and comprehensive user testing with 8 users, we continued revising and iterating on our designs. Our high-fidelity prototyping approach allowed us to receive high-quality and applicable feedback as we continued our iterative processes, and make sure our designs were feasible for implementation.

FINAL DESIGN

Introducing Park & Plug - a seamless experience 🚘🔋

A comprehensive and centralized process for EV drivers to reserve and pay for parking spots and charge their vehicle all in one step directly within the SpotHero platform.

DESIGN VIABILITY

How do our designs integrate into SpotHero's existing product?

Currently, SpotHero is not optimized for EV owners, who occupy over 3% of the total addressable market. The user interface only allows manual filtering for parking locations when faced with an EV's specific charging requirements. 

Now, with the new automated compatibility filter, users are automatically shown only parking locations that fit their needs, eliminating all unnecessary scrolling and comparing. Catering to both EV and non-EV drivers alike, the automation is integrated into the main onboarding process; only users who input an EV vehicle will be shown the new design flow, with the option for users to change their vehicle settings when necessary.

To conclude our project, we also completed a white paper on our project. Take a look here!

What's next❓

Going forward, SpotHero will be using our research, designs and recommendations to benchmark their expansion into the EV market. Thrilling news!

REST & REFLECT ⌛️

💼 Designing for business requirements

As a student designer, I often work on imaginary projects or problem scopes instead of products that address specific business needs. Through this ten-week sprint, I got a glimpse of what it’s like to design products that drive both business and social impact, which makes me super excited for what I get to work on post-graduation.

📶 Making data-driven design decisions

During this project, I had access to both business data provided by SpotHero and user data collected via Feedback Loop (a tool within DISQO’s user testing suite), which supported more informed design decisions. This was instrumental in helping me be more grounded in my design process, and creating a product that served our audience better!

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📣 A huge shoutout to our client, Danny Zagorski, and the entire team at SpotHero for their continuous guidance and support along the way!