We began our case study by defining the user base we were targeting with a proto persona.
Enter Raine Brown! Raine is a genderqueer individual whose interests and needs would lead them to outdoorsy activities, in search of a need for supportive community.
In order to clarify the needs and pain points of our users, we developed and distributed a survey to 23 participants, and interviewed 5 members of the LGBTQ+ community. Below, a few key insights that we gleaned from our survey data:
Survey Insight A >>
>> Out of all of our outdoor activities on offer, our users collectively enjoy hiking, camping, and kayaking most. These activities would make the best targets for featured imagery on the site to inspire engagement.
Survey Insight B >>
>> Users clearly prioritized which pieces of information would be most essential to determining which activities they'd like to join. We need to display these details in an immediately accessible location for each activity on the schedule.
Survey Insight C >>
>> Harassment has occurred during many of our users' most valued outdoor activities. This aligns with the mission of our organization. These data confirm the value that our organization can bring to its users!
We generated an affinity diagram with observations from our user interviews, yielding a neatly detailed bundle of specific insights. Our main take-home points, however, may be simply summarized.
Our users are seeking…
❖ information that’s organized and easy to find
❖ more humanized elements, like stories & pictures
❖ sensory elements of connection with nature
Finally, we conducted a competitor analysis to identify advantageous strategies from similar organizations.
The website for Brave Trails evoked strong emotions with their person-centered visuals, and inclusion of expressive videos over static images.
Diversify Outdoors similarly played on striking visuals, with a greater emphasis on powerful imagery of nature. That said, the organization of information could at times crowd the main page with an excess of information, when it could be better relegated to a secondary page. We wanted to be particularly conscious of this pitfall, as this was a primary weakness of our organization's site before proposed modifications.