Our Team
I led Product Design, Information Architecture, and Interactive Prototyping and contributed to Product and Content Strategy, User Research, Visual Design
Alexia Cohen, UX Researcher
Felipe Villarreal, Senior Visual Designer
Chris Pacetti, Principal Visual Designer
Yuko Osawa, Principal UX Designer
Jen Clark, Creative Director
Mehera O'Brien, Executive Creative Director
Megan Ford, Program Manager
Executive Leadership at Fox Factory—Executive Vice President, CMO, CTO, Director of Product Development, Head of Engineering, Lead Engineers and Technicians.
The Ask
From March - May 2020, we designed a proof-of-concept native mobile ride app that pairs with a forthcoming sensor-enabled suspension system on mountain bikes for hardcore riders who want to optimize their performance.
Specifically, the app would close the gap between the user and their suspension, and achieve four main goals:
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Create a seamless and personalized onboarding experience that pairs a bike’s suspension to start tracking data
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Help riders tune their bike
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Enable them to re-live their best ride moments
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And easily perform bike maintenance
When you get a Ferrari,
but don’t know how to drive it
IDENTIFYING THE PROBLEM
Fox Factory is an industry leader in designing, engineering, and manufacturing high-quality, premium suspension systems for two- and four-wheeled all-terrain vehicles, sported by an impressive roster of pro riders that has made it an aspirational product for mountain bikers looking to dial in their ride.
People were willing to pay for the best equipment, but even with a sophisticated suspension, non-pro mountain bikers still didn’t feel as confident and equipped with the knowledge to get the most bang for their buck.
PRIMARY AND SECONDARY RESEARCH
I conducted a competitive landscape analysis and interviewed subject matter experts (SMEs) with the team to understand and build a shared vocabulary of the sport, mountain bike mechanics, and identify the delta between owning the best suspension and getting the most out of it to achieve “flow” in your ride.
CURRENT STATE USER JOURNEY
We mapped the mountain biker’s journey from pre-purchase to post ride to communicate to business stakeholders the Experience Principles that would guide our design, and early rider insights emerging from our research.
UNCOVERING EARLY INSIGHTS
Starving for a richer data experience
Limited data capture
Third-party riding tech provided limited data capture, so when something didn’t “feel” right about their ride, riders drew heavily from their own memory and bodily feelings, and little, if any, on tracked ride data to identify potential root issues.
Riders also had a limited view into the relevant data that impacts continuous performance improvement on the trail.
Confidence and knowledge
Unsure of how to tune their own suspension to improve their performance, riders relied on word of mouth for proper recommendations.
Suspension maintenance
Fox had a disjointed mail-in suspension service experience, leading riders to service in person with non-Fox mechanics who often didn't know how to properly tune and maintain Fox suspension.
CONCEPT STORYBOARD & EARLY WIREFRAMES
The “Happy Path” of the future experience
I produced wires for the concept storyboard to facilitate kickoff discussion and reach alignment with Fox's Executive Leadership on the Product Vision, Feature Definition, Tech and Product Requirements, and Product Strategy that meets both business and user needs and goals.
The design is not just what it looks like and feels like. The design is how it works.
— Steve Jobs
CONCEPT DESIGN
From low to high fidelity
I wrote the user story to produce the necessary low-fidelity wireframes across the end-to-end user experience, and designed content with real and contextually relevant data for validation research.
In the later stages, my work shifted to focus on solving the functional logic and interaction for tuning your suspension, the most technically difficult part of the app’s experience.
REMOTE VALIDATION RESEARCH
I led interviews with the Global Technician for Fox Factory's pro riders and SME on suspension tuning to identify and prioritize
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Which features were worth pursuing
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How and when riders would find them most beneficial
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And validate the technical accuracy of content and logic of feature functionality
INTERACTIVE PROTOTYPE
When it moves, it wins
I built the final deliverable, a UI simulation of the end-to-end ride app experience, for the CTO to socialize across company leadership.
Tune with confidence
Tune functionality takes the guesswork out of suspension tuning, enabling the rider to simulate a change before updating the physical knobs. Saved tunes organizes all necessary factors for a perfectly dialed-in suspension, such as sag and spring rate, volume spacers, rebound, and compression.
The perfect companion
Data gathered in the Bike Setup process enables the app to be fully personalized. Here, the rider can create bike profiles, pair their bluetooth enabled suspension, and establish a baseline tune.
Track your personal performance
Ride Playback is fully customizable, offering a novel cockpit view into data from the trail. Riders can select from 12 different factors, such as pedal cadence, suspension travel, air time and harshness, with the option to pair it with video from the ride. The Race a Friend feature enables the rider to go head-to-head with a fellow Fox rider who completed the same trail.
Convenient Suspension Service
Fork Usage and Service tracks riding conditions, locations, and hours to gauge suspension health.
Make it easy to service suspension through contextual service recommendations seamless and transparent Fox service experience that includes:
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Step-by-step instructions for removing the bike’s suspension system,
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The assigned Fox Service Tech
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Expected return delivery date
