XD5002 Design Document - Amazon Alexa App Redesign

Critical Reflection
Overall, I feel that I have been able to successfully craft a design response which
meets the needs and requisites of both the brief and my target user demographic. I
feel that this has been supported, thanks to my research process, which proved vital
in allowing me to not only bring my own user experiences from being an Amazon
Alexa user, but it also enabled me to step outside of the box and critically examine
the needs of the mass user base as a whole - allowing me to gain a vital scope into
the app, which I feel has influenced my final design.
One of the tasks which I felt worked well, was the ability to create a useful UI. The
tight-knit integration of information and relevant user-generated content has in
not only my view, but also my user testers opinions have brought a true sense of
purpose to an app which generally didn’t have a substantial enough reason to keep
returning to use it (aside from troubleshooting Alexa devices). If I was to expand
upon this idea and develop the prototype into a fully fleshed-out app, I would strive
to continue focussing on this crucial aspect of the app in order to fully ensure that
any additional functionality is added to allow all users to benefit and be able to take
something away from their experience using this app.
However, I feel that a key area I would like to expand on to complement this would
be expanded user testing stages. Due to the time and practicality constraints, I
wasn’t able to test with users from different demographics (such as over 60s). If I
were to expand upon this project, I would like to spend some more time focussing
on studying and finding out what features might be available and beneficial to
their needs. This could include for instance: being able to use the Alexa Assistant in
cases of an emergency (in order to contact a family member, trusted contact or the
Emergency Services).
Additionally, if I was to develop this fully, I would also like to be able to understand
the practicality of some of the features from a developer perspective (in order for
me to be able to further understand and address the strengths and weaknesses of
the existing app with a realistic sense of what can be achieved). This would prove
beneficial in addressing some of the user concerns as cited in the Google Play
Reviews of glitches or improperly functioning elements of the app, as a means of
helping to mitigate and reduce the likelihood of these occurances happening in the
future.
In summary, I feel the solution that I have created succeeds at meeting the
recommendations of the brief alongside adhering to the goals and changes
sought after from examining the original Amazon Alexa app, to provide a more
visually pleasing, functional and usable solution that could offer a great benefit
and advantage to Amazon’s customers in comparison to their competitors such as
Google Home and Apple HomePod.
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