Design by Accretion

Context

Assumptions

Below discussed features will be launched initially in Mumbai. After seeing the response from the audience, it will be decided to launch in other cities.

Competitors

• Uber
• Ola Cabs
• other cab services

Why Meru?

Most Indian suburbs rely on travel cabs for their day to day commute. Since Meru provides the option to book cabs rides from the app and also customer find the ride cost also, it is more popular amongst Indian customers.

Background

Roads and neighborhoods in India are complicated enough that the GPS & ICE ALERT systems too, sometimes fail to accurately locate someone. Because of this, most drivers on Meru cab usually end up calling the passengers to ask and confirm their exact location. Although it works fine most of the time, it still leaves out a certain group of passengers i.e. the ones who have hearing and speech impairment. Meru cab does indeed provide an alternative to send text messages to drivers, other issues such as possible differences in language, education level make it very hard to communicate the simplest instructions.

If anyone is unable to pick up the call or let the driver know their exact location, they end up having their rides cancelled. Because of this, deaf and dumb passengers usually have to rely on someone else to book their rides or prefer to not use such apps at all.

Process

User Personas

Personas are great for representing potential users of a product. Creating personas helped me refine my ideas of who I am designing for. Normally, I would collaborate with User Researchers to use data to create accurate user personas. For this ideation, I used my own assumptions to create two personas: a frequent rider, an occasional rider.

Personas #1 : Frequent Rider

Personas #2 : Occasional Rider

This brainstorming activity helped me better understand the different types of riders and drivers that use Meru Cab’s platform. I assumed the following conclusions

Every rider and driver relationship is unique. The rider and driver could be from different parts of the world but are being brought together for this ride. The riders want to have a good experience with their driver.

Drivers have flexibility with their commitment to Meru and drivers need good ratings so that they can continue to drive with Meru. Drivers are open to making some level of accommodations for riders that will improve their ratings.

These personas helped me better empathize with users. I used these personas to refer to throughout the product cycle to stay customer focused.

User Research

Gathering feedback from users is important to set the direction of a product. I wanted a better understanding of the problem space, so I texted three of my friends two general questions. I didn’t want to mention Meru or anything specific to this problem. My goal was to better understand the problem space at a high level.

Question #1 : what would you want to know about her before picking her up?

Question #2 : What would you ask me about her before she gave you a ride?

Home Screen

Most of the times, a user opens the app to either book a ride or to compare the rates of different types of cabs like Meru & Genie(Small Cars). This means that generally, Meru explore the various other services offered by Meru. All they want is to quickly get the reach time and price.

Availability Checking for Intercity Cab

Bring your goal closer to you. Whether you're on a road trip, traveling cross-country, heading to the airport or looking for a change of scenery, make Meru Caps Intercity your preferred choice for hassle-free intercity travel. Enjoy comfortable and cheap rides with these benefits.

ICE Alert

ICE Alert in Meru cabs to safeguard customer in any emergency Meru Cabs recently launched the Meru mobile app for iPhone and Android devices that enables instant cab booking process even more convenient for Customers. What makes the application even more special is that it offers a unique, first of its kind service called “ICE Alert” that can be used by Meru customers “In case of any emergency” Safety being the forefront of Meru’s Technological innovations. ICE Alert will help the customer be prepared for emergencies wherein they will be able to alert their trusted ones immediately at the press of a ICE Alert button.

Launch

After Rider Profiles is extensively designed and tested, the feature will be ready for launch. The plan will begin by launching the first iteration of the Rider Profiles. The feature will only be available for Premium Meru rides. The initial launch will be available in Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad and Bangalore. Those cities were chosen for their population and contrast in both income and cultures. Data from these two launches will help Meru understand the type of market this feature will be successful in for future expansion.

Metrics of Success

Success for Meru Rides will be measured by analyzing how the feature meets the objective of strengthening the relationship between Meru rides and drivers to create enjoyable and safer riding experiences. Defining key metrics to track is important to understand if Meru Profiles is meeting its objective.

Engagement

Next, we want to explore if Rider Profiles is increasing engagement. The first way to measure this is to see if the profiles are impacting ratings. We will need to compare the ratings that drivers are receiving on normal rides compared to rides with users that completed a Rider Profile. We will also explore if the users with a Rider Profile are more likely to rate and give compliments to their driver.

Conclusion

Meru Profiles is a feature that has a lot of potential to innovate the current rider and driver relationship. I created this feature with the objective of strengthening the relationship between Meru riders and drivers. I believe that the human connection between riders and drivers has a lot of unrealized potential for Meru.