Time zone Assistant
Helping people across time zones connect successfully
Photo by Ketut Subiyanto from Pexels
THE PROBLEM
Families and friends are increasingly spreading all over a single country or even all over the world. Staying connected across time zones and geographical boundaries can be tricky. Although communications are a lot easier now, time difference is still a challenge.
THE SOLUTION
Time Zone Assistant is a conceptual extension to any mobile device that helps mobile users across time zones connect successfully by automatically telling them the local time of the person they are trying to connect with.
WHAT MAKES TIME ZONE ASSISTANT UNIQUE?
Time Zone Assistant is not another app that mobile phone users need to install. It is an extension within the native call and messaging apps.
ROLE & TIMElINE
User Experience. This was a six-week project.
KEY GOAL
Create a click-through prototype to communicate minimum viable product.
WHAT I DID
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Product storyboarding & user research.
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User Experience Design including user flows and wireframes.
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Created high fidelity wireframes to show the full product experience.
INTERVIEWS
I interviewed 7 people aged 35-50 with parents and siblings in both coasts of the US and abroad. I conducted the interviews through emails and phone calls.
Questions:
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What is the most challenging feat in connecting with friends/family living far away/abroad?
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How do you communicate/what method?
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How often do you connect with each other currently, and what would be ideal?
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What do you want to share: video, images, share screen?
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What is the accessibility (connection) in the areas or countries where you want to be able connect to?
MY hypotheses
Time zone is an issue, most of the time, they forget what time it is where, say, their parents are; this is why—I think—they don't connect as often as they'd like to. Their goal is to be aware of what time it is elsewhere so that they don't forget to call because it's too late. They would like to be reminded or made aware of time zones. With the event of social media - connecting has been easier, but does it help one-to-one direct/real time communication?
UNDERSTANDING THE USER
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Most found time zone differences the trickiest, especially those with older parents, they don’t seem to automatically think about what time it is that they are calling other people in other countries.
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They also found that remembering to call (or send message) at the right time for families and/or friends in different time zone is easy to forget.
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They want to send text messages without waking up the recipient on the side side of the world while they’re asleep.
I synthesized data collected from the interviews and organized them into six main categories
COMPETITOR ANALYSIS
Based on interviews, they use different apps to connect. Certain apps are more popular in certain country. While most have very similar features such as text, video and audio calls, photos and videos sharing, group chats, none has attempted to tackle time zone differences.
“While most have very similar features...none has attempted to tackle time zone differences.”
PERSONA
Bobbi is a 37 years old project manager at a design agency in Portland, OR. She is married but no children. She is from Amsterdam and has been in Portland for 9 years. She grew up in South-East Asia because of her parent's line of work, went back to Amsterdam when she was 15.
Behaviors & Habits
Bobbi has friends and families all over the world. Most of her family is in Europe, but a lot of her friends are spread out in Asia and Australia. She keeps constant communication using group chat with them, but she makes call/face time her parents on the weekends. All communications are done on her iPhone.
Needs, Problems & Goals
While she is usually pretty aware of time zone difference, her family isn’t. She would like to not get phone calls and messages — unless of emergency, while she is asleep.
problem statement
Bobbi needs a way to communicate real time easily because she needs to actually be able to talk to her family at the right time.
We believe that by improving the feature of current phone/messaging apps for Bobbi we will achieve more successful communication. We will know this to be true when she gets less calls and messages at 3 AM.
how might we...
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easily tell people what time it is where they're calling to?
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delay messages or calls to different country if it's not important?
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not wake people up when called/sent message at odd hours unless it's an emergency?
useR stories
As Bobbi, she wants to:
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not accidentally call anyone or send text at 3 AM
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set a reminder to call at a later time
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not forget to send message later
so she can successfully communicate with her family abroad at the right time.
POSSIBLE FEATURES:
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Local time for each contact
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Customizable notification when to call overseas
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Option to call now or set a reminder to call later
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Option to send delayed message
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Option to send message silently or delayed
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Dedicated space on home screen for several global times
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Being able to call directly from a notification banner at the reminder time set
TITLE OF THE CALLOUT BLOCK
STORYBOARD
Storyboards helped envision possible scenarios of trying to get in touch with someone abroad.
1. Calling abroad
Bobbi is informed right away what time it is now in Germany.
2. sending delayed message
Bobbi can schedule her message to be sent later.
minimum viable product
Based on impact vs expectation, the three features that would satisfy the users needs are:
1. Local time for each contact
By accessing their contacts, user should be able to see what time it is where the person is. The local time will be based on the phone number or address.
2. Option to call now or later (set time)
Sometimes users don’t go to the address book/contact to call or message someone - they will just tap the call icon, then the user will be alerted what is the local time and given options to still call, set a reminder to call later, or send a text message.
3. Option to send delayed/scheduled message
This works similarly to the call button, an alert will appear and a picker will be used to set the scheduled time.
Feature prioritization based on impact and expectation.
useR flow
Time Zone Assistant will be an intuitive experience as mobile users already know how to make a call and send text messages—it integrates with the native the calling or messaging app.
Time Zone Assistant does not change how users call or send message, it adds time notification that helps users decide what to do knowing the local time of the receivers.
sketches & paper prototype
Creating paper prototype to show functionality of the end product allowed me to quickly visualize and test the idea.
wireframes
I created lo-fi wireframes and click-through prototype to do initial usability testing.
high fidelity
I created a click through prototype in inVision to represent Time Zone Assistant functionality integrated with native phone app.
When user taps on the call button of a contact, time notification will appear giving the user options of how they want to proceed.
When a user taps on the send button after composing a message, they will have the option of sending it right away regardless of the time at the destination or schedule it for later (which will be noted below the visually different than a regular sent message).
TITLE OF THE CALLOUT BLOCK
usability test
I was able to have three of the seven people I interviewed use the click-through prototype.
what went well
All of them really liked the simplicity of being shown what time it was where they're calling to. One of them thought when calling, he didn't need options to set reminder or send text later. Most liked both delayed text reminder and call later reminder.
what could be improved
I had not thought of what happens when someone is traveling outside their timezone. We don’t always know the location, would just using their contact information from the address book be enough?
next steps
The Time Zone Assistant is quite a simple product, at this point I need to think about the development, decision of how to decide the location of the user: is GPS needed, or use information in the address book—which could either be phone number or address.
Another challenge is how to handle travels, is it up to the user to update that information? Or this is something that can’t be controlled.
I’d like this to be a standard feature of all iOS and Android devices, perhaps it is something mobile phone users can turn on or off in their settings.
I also was thinking how to monetize this product. Partnering with telecommunications company perhaps?