The Nomad’s Companion
Because keeping your fingers crossed that everything will go as planned is a bad idea.
Moving anywhere is stressful and even more so if the culture, customs, language, and/or laws are different. However, with the proper tools to navigate your new environment, working abroad can be rewarding and fun.
Direct and Indirect Competitors
Most competitors fall into two categories - travel guides and social network platforms.
Travel guides are typically organized as a database of short overviews of different topics. Some also include other helpful information such as phrasebooks, currency converters, and checklists. However, most specialize in assisting tourists, rather than expats. Guide services that do focus on expats tend to be poorly organized and require a lot of browsing to find what is needed.
Social media platforms, on the other hand, typically offer real-time features such as private chats, discussion boards, interest groups forums, and special events. While these can be helpful and relevant to any expat service, they are better covered by established social media platforms such as Facebook.
Interviews and Personas
I interviewed twelve expats living in ten countries and employed in occupations ranging from teaching to engineering. My objective was to better understand expats’ motivations for living abroad and the difficulties they faced while adjusting to their new lives. By categorizing the goals, incentives, values, and pain points of my core user group, I then analyzed and summarized their experiences into the following personas.
“I love to take notes and highlight and fold the pages. If I want to look back, it is easy to find what I need.”
-Anonymous Expat Interviewee
It can be noted that much of my inspiration during the design process was generated by observing how users manipulated physical guidebooks and then experimenting with how I could convert that experience into a digital one.
Prototyping Methods
Card Sort
A card sort was incorporated for designing the website’s information architecture and helped me optimize the organization of the app’s content for my target users.
User Flow Diagram
Before drawing any screens I first created a user flow diagram to organize anticipated user paths. This ensured that every user step would be considered.
Wireframing
Following the research phase, I designed several iterations of wireframe prototypes. Each included minor but necessary adjustments to both the user experience and visual design of the app. By doing so, I was able to find solutions to problems found during continuous user testing and optimize my users’ experience.
The Final Deliverable
One of my primary insights from our research is that living abroad includes an extensive and often unique compilation of variables, often making each expat’s experience profoundly different. Because there was usually not a “one size fits all” solution, it was very important to provide the flexibility for users to customize this application to their individual needs.
I also created a platform for users to verify information they received through the app with more veteran expats. In future iterations, I anticipate including more note taking features to further simulate how people use physical guide books.
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My final product, The Nomad’s Companion, was a digital guide that could help people quickly and effectively navigate the challenges of living abroad and acclimate to their new home.