The Fork app: New feature

Creating a fictional new feature for The Fork application.

As we all know, The Fork is a leading online restaurant reservation site in Europe with 80.000 partner restaurants. The Fork guides us in the search for the perfect restaurant for each moment, it allows us to book it in real-time, and we could enjoy exclusive offers. In few clicks and the table’s reserved! Thanks to geo-tracking, The Fork locates the nearest restaurants for you and helps you book the best table fast and directly from your smartphone.

So once you have downloaded the application on your phone, get signed up and start searching for available restaurants in the city you’re in. Then just move ahead with the reservation. You will get a confirmation in your app also via email. With The Fork application, you don’t need to print out anything or flash your phone at the hostess stand. Just walk in, give your name, take a seat, order, and enjoy your meal. Yes, it is an effortless way to reserve your table, indeed.

Now we’re going to move on to the initial brief:

Forget about the perfect date at the best restaurant in the city, this time user will dump someone at the worst restaurant by using The Fork’s new feature.

I know it seems tragic right? But let’s find out how my brain works for this tricky and challenging project.

Discovery Phase

First, let’s discover the competitors. Here we have the direct competitors that do the do the same job in the same way such are the other table reservation app. Then we have the secondary competitors that do the same job in a different way which are all the restaurants in the city that user can call directly for booking a table, and we also have indirect competitors that do the different job with a conflicting outcome, such are the food delivery apps.

The Fork’s app competitors.

For this discovery phase, I divided the questionnaires in two using a Google Survey. One for The Fork users that include 5 users, and the other to dig deeper user experience in a break-up include 6 users to have quantitative data, and the results are:

1. 40% of the participants use The Fork app twice a month.
2. 50% of the participants give 7 out of 10 points in general experience using The Fork app.
3. There is a good deal promotion on using The Fork app which they like.
4. They use the app to find a good resto on a special occasion.
5. What do they feel about the break-up emotion? Sad, terrible, heart-breaking, hardest part of my life. Here some insights that I found: ‘’Terrible, one of the worst emotional pains in life.’’ and ‘’I felt like an empty broken glass without knowing how to fix it.’’
6. 83% of the participants said never experience a breakup situation in a public area.
7. 80% of the participants said don’t agree with the idea of breaking up with someone at the resto. Here some insights that I found: “it’s selfish because the person that is left has to hide her emotions in a terrible moment.’’ also this “It’s a weird idea. Because for me a restaurant is the place to share a great moment.’’ and this “It is not a proper place because at least we always need private moments to end up a relationship with someone because you shared life and gave your heart to someone.’’
8. 50% of the participants said that is a very bad idea.
9. Last but not least, some break-up stories that relevant to the project:

• The guy tried to dump me six months earlier in a restaurant and that was absolutely humiliating and traumatic for me, I felt he was completely insensitive to have done that to me in public.
• I was heartbroken and even in pretty bad depression because I was dwelling with the guilt inside me. Nothing I could do about it.
• Someone did it to me once and I cried in front of everybody, it was really humiliating. Also once I had a boyfriend who got at me in a restaurant and I got just as ashamed so I would never break up with someone in a restaurant, I would do it at home, and if I’m scared I would do it in the street or in a park.

To resume this step, now we have the pain points and the gain points:

Pain Point:

• Breakup moment is sad, terrible, heartbreaking.
• Need to hide the emotion in a terrible moment.

Gain Point:

• User satisfied with overall user flow of the application.
• Restaurant is the place to share a great moment.

So now it’s time to pivot!

To be more focused on the user’s point of view, I need to change the direction:

Make a perfect break-up plan at the restaurant using The Fork’s new feature and let it be the last moment together.

And if you wondering the reason why… Keep in mind that the worst restaurant means bad quality of food and service and people tend to not waste their money on something unsatisfied. And I think it’s awful to support a mental abuse situation. Remember the story of the user felt humiliating in front of people when someone broke up with her?

Product Definition

The idea was:

My Special day, the new feature to help users prepare a special day at the restaurant by creating personalize greeting cards and ask a special request with virtual assistance service.

So basically, users have 2 options either they create their personalized greeting card on the app and will have the printed version right at the restaurant, or they can call the virtual assistant who can help them plan and execute their special request for any special day event at the restaurant. Users can also use both options and call the virtual assistant to simply confirm the request.

User’s motivation: Don’t want to be in a toxic relationship anymore. User’s goal: Breakup with someone.

The concept in a sentence:

This is our last moment together that changes us forever…

So the story was user wants to break-up the relationship with someone and decided to make it a great last moment, then wants to give a break-up letter that already done on the application at the end of mealtime, so that person will open the letter outside the restaurant.

The Fork’s new feature user flow

Usability Testing

Is the practice of testing how easy a design is to use with a group of representative users. It usually involves observing users as they attempt to complete tasks and can be done for different types of designs. It is often conducted repeatedly, from early development until a product’s release.

In this step, I did the test with 4 representatives users with the hi-fi prototype, and the results are:

• Users didn’t notice the new feature.
• They reserved directly the table without asking for a special request.
• Users need to get informed about the new feature.
• Users need to have more options on special requests.

So then I decided to fix some problems in order to improve user experience by changing some elements on the user interaction design and adding the “new-end” on every new feature’s pages to attract the user’s attention.

The Prototype

Try the new feature by tapping a full screen for a better experience.

Next Step

After the successful presentation in front of Ironhackers classmates and the teacher, I got many positives feedbacks. So then I was thinking My Special Day feature in the future could give more experience to be able to build an event organizer that user could create an event by theme they like with an event planner to coordinate the restaurant owner, all of the moving parts and vendors, and makes sure user’s invitations have a good time at the restaurant they reserved on The Fork app.

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See you in the next case study!