Beyond | Portfolio

January 2020 - March 2020

Beyond 1.0 : SAAS Platform

Web Experience Design through a brand mascot for a SAAS platform

User Experience Design, User Interface Design, Character Development | Company Project

Challenge

Project to build the brand ‘Beyond’ and create an intuitive experience for the SAAS application through web design and character development.

Statement of Problem

At present, Unthinkable Solutions LLP has separate in-house products which are handled by different teams in a solitary manner. This increases the handling cost of the company and creates a communication gap. The secluded structure makes it difficult for the firm to handle their analytics and furthermore increases the churn rate, with more customers opting out in order to look for SaaS applications that provide a better service. With the number of multi-modal applications in the market, the challenge is to come up with a unique way to penetrate.

Introduction

Beyond 1.0 is the first version of the upcoming SAAS platform ‘Beyond‘. Beyond is a project which will act as an umbrella of all the in-house products of Daffodil Software under Unthinkable. The main products include Autoload & Yellow.live. ‘Yellow.live’ caters to the education industry and ‘Autoload’ is for the transportation industry, although both have their USP functionality as Tracking. Beyond aims at being a critical partner for every owner whose money is on the 'road'.

Team Structure

A team of 3 with a UX/UI designer, Visual designer and a content writer have created the product from the ideation part for its positioning, targeting and personality development till the execution stage of the live website.

My roles throughout the project:

• Researcher

• UX/UI Designer

• Illustrator

Goals

• Profit

• Relieve Stress

• Productive Time consumption

• One Click Management

• Visibility for easier communication

• Safety and security

• Time and Resource Management

• Provide advocacy & Inclusiveness to the client

Pain Points

• Human error

• Stress

• Losses/Money wasted

• Irregular Methodologies of the stakeholders of the process

Product Understanding

The Product SAAS Beyond includes two main products namely Autoload and Yellow.live and more to be added in the future.

AUTOLOAD: BEYOND LOGISTICS

Autoload is a product for the logistics industry for tracking the exact locations of trucks/ and other vehicles used for transporting goods. Integrated Trip management solution to fill the gap of communications and inaccurate information among manufacturers and Transporters.

Key benefits:

Real time trackability of trucks.

24*7 truck reports

Abnormal halt alerts and late arrival notifications.

Complete history

Pain Points:

Efficiency - Dependency on drivers, Unknown routes/delays.

Trackability - Wastage of inventory costs , and unaware of the proper situation of the load.

Stakeholders in the system include:-

Manufacturers , Transporters, Consignee

Competitors:

Fleetx, Roambee, Fareye and etrans have been seen as the direct potential competitors of yellow.live. They have been analysed on the basis of aim, USP, Target, Key features and value propositions

Clients:

Jindal, Vedanta, Larsen and Turbo, Hindustan Zinc limited, Exide

YELLOW.LIVE: BEYOND EDUCATION

Yellow.live is one of the successful products of Unthinkable. It is a real time bus monitoring solution Safety certified transport system. It is right now being used by more than 400 schools and 1 lac parents.

Key benefits:

Geo-fencing

Single Window Dashboard

Monitoring Multiple trips - Distance travelled, trips, vehicle halts,student capacity

Breakdown alerts

Pain Points:

Trackability

Efficiency - Dependency on drivers, Unknown routes/delays.

Responsibility on the owners/principle

Stakeholders in the system include:-

Owner, Principle, Admin, Parents, Bus driver, Transport incharge, Conductor

Competitors:

Orahi and Track school bus have been seen as the direct potential competitors of yellow.live. Their aim, USP, Target, Key features and value propositions were analysed to understand the personality and USP of Beyond well.

Clients:

Euro Kids, GD Goenka, Maple bear Canadian School, Bachpan play school, Kidzee

Concept

" Rediscover your smile at work "

A lot of time is consumed in low level tasks of the day lead to an unproductive mood and major losses. A number of small tasks take up the time which could have been used by the professional in a more productive manner. Example, If a person is focusing on writing an important report and they get the tasks of sending an urgent mail at the same time and has to attend another call too. The unorganised gaps of communication and tracking in the systems lead to chaos, losses and frustrated surroundings. Therefore the main focus has been on the proper handling of the smaller tasks which give fresh ideas space and hence rediscovering the smiles. Technology Solutions that help you manage tasks for a stress free work experience

Competitive Analysis

An in-depth research was done to find out the competitors for beyond analysed on the basis of aim, USP, Target, Key features, value propositions and their site's Information Architecture experience. Here are 3 main competitors with their USPs listed:-

Target Users:

Startups to SMBs to non-profit businesses All Industries for sales,service, marketing IT, sustainability, collaboration.

USP :

One stop sales management solution.

Value Propositions :

Customised solutions according to the needs of different businesses, Features that enable the user to run his business from home.

Target Users:

All types of businesses, from startups to SMBs to large companies and home businesses Sales, marketing, customer support, accounting and back office operations.

USP :

A complete customisable operating system for a business.

Value Propositions :

Focuses more on product development and customer support than sales and marketing. Free product versions to enhance customer engagement.

Target Users :

Small and medium businesses Need customer acquisition, customer support asset management, sales, CRM etc.

USP :

Eases complexity and saves time further reducing costing. Single-Industry centric. Customized AI bots.

Personal Freddy AI

Value Propositions :

All sorts of management tools at a single platform.

Marketing

Value Proposition

(i) Live Status Dashboards for Each Stakeholder With Sophisticated Analytics

(ii) Predictive Indicators and Instant Alerts For Deviations

(iii) Integration with your existing hardware and systems- To save Time, Cost and Plug Revenue Leaks

(iv) Accurate data Uses google api’s to give you the exact data, not approximations

(v) Integrated Technology: Integrated with the latest technologies like Amazon Alexa.

(vi) Simple Pricing: Usage based pricing

Segmentation

The Product ‘Beyond’ has been analysed and assessed according to the requirements of the stakeholders as well as the decision makers. The Segmentation of the brand has been seen to be focusing on 3 segments:-

Segment 1:

Large industries with big expensive plant operations ( 1000-5000 employees or more ) ; Must have own inventory

Segment 2:

Private/Public sector schools which own their own buses ; Schools with large franchises ; School Owners dealing under many different industries

Segment 3:

Individuals looking to bid high into the manufacturing or schooling industry and looking for the best possible management solution

Targeting

'Beyond' targets the segment under logistics and educational industries that have huge investments, the confidence and trust of safety and security of this investment. Beyond provides customers a simple one portal, multi-product platform as a solution. This will be done by picking onto our clients’ pain-points and hence induce them into realising their need for a cost-efficient and time-saving solution with automated analytics.

Positioning

Positioning Beyond as critical partners to the high-spending managerial(logistics and ed-tech) industry by providing efficient solutions. Beyond tries to fulfil the gap between the consumers and their systems which worsens and makes life complex due to human errors or excel sheets. The brand has been positioned in the market as the portal which provides the consumers with the simplest solutions to their most critical systems, the most invested asset. It is a tool for managing an organisation, company, a group or an individual providing clarity and simplicity for complications of different levels .

Beyond would be seen as a time-saving, integrated solution to most of the manual, individual complexity solutions in one’s system. A brand which is trustworthy and empathetic enough to understand the effects of the slightest shift or haphazard in the system and hence work for ideating for them, their needs.

Archetype

The Beyond archetype: Regular guy + The Hero.

Supporting it's traits of being simple, personal yet elite and confident.

Regular Guy Traits: Down to earth, supportive, faithful, folksy, person next door, connects with others

The Hero Traits: Courageous, bold, honourable, strong, confident, inspirational

Brand Personality

Brand personality of the product was carefully identified with the help of the in-depth analysis of the suitable personality as well as the take of stakeholders/ Decision-makers.

Brand Personality Survey

Eg, If our beyond’s personality falls on the number 1 that is purely elite and the celebrity chosen falls on the same number then they are marked a full score ‘1’ but if it falls on a number right beside it which is 2 then the celebrity is scored ‘1/2‘ and if it is farther i.e. 3 or 4 then scored ‘0‘

Brand Personality survey results

Beyond's personality's primary traits came out to be

Elite • Simple • Witty • Timeless • Authoritative • Flexible • Precise

whereas the secondary traits were expected to be

Masculine yet Feminine • Confident yet emotional • Mature yet young • Energetic yet calm • Personal yet Professional

• Realistic yet Imaginative • Playful yet Serious • Curious yet Professorial

Sushmita Sen

Sushmita Sen is an Indian Actress known for her wit and knowledge. She is a strong independent woman, who is confident enough to take major decisions of life, and would never choose to rely upon others for the same. She is very energetic sort of person , but still prefer to be calm at certain instances. She has been confident and ambitious for whatever she has done in life and an Influential personality. Sushmita was Miss universe at the young age of 18.

Survey

Now our product required a human persona to be associated with. Several potential personas of influential personalities were listed down and then scored on the basis of a self created marking system.

In the same way we found where wonder woman was quite close to our character being timeless and confident, she was more of mass appeal than elite. APJ Abdul Kalam turned out to be too poetic was us, Amir khan too feminine and Harsha Bhogle too stubborn even after possessing the right wit. By the end, we were stuck with two personalities which were very close to being the the right persona for beyond ‘Akshay Kumar‘ and ‘Sushmita sen‘.

Akshay Kumar : 13/15

Sushmita Sen : 13.5/15

Clearly we had a winner, Sushmita Sen

Considered:-

Wonder woman

Akshay Kumar

APJ Abdul Kalam

Amir Khan

Harsha Bhogle

Character Development

After finalising on the personality traits of the brand, the next step was identifying the needs for a character of the brand which would be the mascot. Important aspect of the study was to understand the need of traits as well as the different emphasis category of each trait in the character development of the mascot.

MoSCoW Map

The Design process of Moscow mapping was done to get a clearer understanding of the need of the traits in the mascot.

Design Process: MoSCoW Mapping

M - Must have

S - Should have

C - Could have

W - Would have

Segregation and priority chart for the traits of the mascot

The personality traits were further segregated and prioritised on the basis of 4 categories for emphasis:-

• Physical appearance

• Tone of voice

• Outfits/props

• Aura

Category & Criteria

Choosing the type of Character to finalise is another important step in the character development. 6 categories were identified namely, Humans, Plants, Animals, Artificial intelligence elements, Cartoons/animated characters, Objects. In another survey done among the design team and the stakeholders all the categories were rated on the basis of the

following criteria:-

• Relatability: The quality of being easily understood or appreciated.

• Reliability: The quality of being trustworthy or of performing consistently well.

• Scalability: Acceptable across religions and cultures.

• Longevity: Ease with which a product can be maintained in order to: correct defects or their cause, repair or replace.

Interlinked with self-sustainance.

The survey was conducted after briefing the stakeholders about the brand personality and the project. The categories which got rated the most were AI and human with their reasonings. So we finalised on having a Humanoid a mix of AI and human.

Survey Forms with the results

Inspiration

Hritik Roshan as Arjun From Ye Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara has been taken as the inpiration for the mascot of the product. Arjun has possessed all the required appropriate personality traits that we require in our mascot. Throughout the movie he can be seen flexible and yet very focused. He has been a character with charm to captivate the audience’s attention and a workaholic, witty and yet kind human.

Hritik Roshan as Arjun From 'Ye Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara'

Beyond Buddy is a 32 yrs male humanoid who is a workaholic and is very particular about giving best results. He is direct and witty at the same time and can be quite friendly and helpful without making the other person feel intimidated. He looks approachable and still maintains his professional, elite and timeless outlook.

Character Illustration (MVP Phase)

A faster Development of a mascot was done for the beta version of the product “Beyond“ following the MVP model with the most basic and only the important functionality prospects in the product. The illustration was manipulated according to the existing style and iconography of the company.

100% Control

Broad Visibility

One Click Management

Character: Beyond Buddy

Beyond Buddy is a 32 yrs male humanoid who is of Indian ethnicity of 9 feet height and lean built body.

The character has been worked upon by creating multiple iterations, exploring different gestures and emphasising on the props and their relatability towards the brand’s products.

Basic 9-heads stick figure sketches of the various gestures for the mascot.

Sketches of the the various gestures to suit different roles of the education and the transportation industry.

Morphing of the character from the basic 9-heads stick figure sketches to a more solid form.

Morphing of the character from the body form to a clothed mascot.

Basic 9-heads figure sketches in outfits for different roles in the education and the transportation industry.

Medium fidelity sketches in outfits for different roles in the education and the transportation industry.

Final illlustrations in different roles and various outfits, Color scheme and style of the brand.

Final illustrations in different roles and various gestures. Color scheme and style of the brand.

Facial Expressions

25 Facial expressions for the mascot ‘Beyond Buddy‘.

25 Facial expressions for the mascot ‘Beyond Buddy‘.

Mood Board

The Color scheme chosen is based on the existing branding of Unthinkable.

Monochromatic color scheme – tones and shades

Keywords: Professional, Growth, young, minimal , safety,

freshness, healing, authority , trust finance/profit

User Persona

User Persona is a way to deeply understand the ideal user of the product which helps identifying their pain points and make solutioning easier. We have taken a persona of ‘Sunil Singh‘.

Information Architecture

Low-fi & Mid-fi Wireframes Iterations

After many iterations based on research and several versions of wireframes based on the feedbacks from the stakeholder meetings, these are the screens.

Home Page

Beyond Logistics

Beyond Education

About Us

Thank You for giving Beyond your time!

Hey!

I'm Himani Singh

UX/UI Designer & Illustrator.

Beyond 1.0 : SAAS Platform