After a few days of research, our team had three hypothesis about the strongest causes of the problem:
1. Some people might have experienced critical performance problems
2. People did not understand the app's purpose at first sight
3. People from non-compatible cities were trying to use the app
Behavior flow of one of the users that uninstalled the app within 3 minutes of usage.
After the analysis, it was clear that the users did not see the buses ETAs before uninstalling. Since this is the app's core service, it had to be solved. To retain more people in the app, the challenge was:
”How can we show public transport ETA right in the home screen and without harming the user experience?”
It was time to craft around this purpose. The map would continue to be the app's protagonist, so the initial sketches show the efforts regarding other visual elements, such as bottomsheets, alerts and overlays.
Variatons to the new screen. From left to right: map-only, map with shortcuts bottomsheet and ETA preview with Haptic Touch.
The map-only variation was quickly thrown away, since a previous version of the app used this paradigm but didn't have good acceptance through the users.
The best ones showed ETAs and quick access to favorite bus stops and lines without taking too much space from the map, where the users could locate themselves and the surroundings. The following prototypes explored what could be done alongside these restrictions.
The prototypes show experimentations on components, as well as useful additional info to commuters, like weather conditions.
Final solution and key results
After spending a significant amount of time generating variations and enhancing the core parts of the user experience, the team finally achieved the version that was ready to go to production, as shown below. A few early tests helped adjusting subtle details, like giving the user an option to see the lines names (besides their prefix or number) - the first mental model is more common in Salvador and Recife, while the second is found in the Southeast, like in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
Final version of the screens, release in November 2022.
A few weeks later, when 100% of the users were already using the new version, the team saw exactly the metric change that was expected - a steep reduction on the churn rate:
Two months after the release, uninstall rates on the 24 first hours of use dropped 37%.
As a consequence, users started making more sessions and spending more time in the app, since now it was clear that the ETAs were the app's best service.
Bonus: another round of UI improvements
Almost 2 years after the latest big update, the app had one more round of visual adjustments, this time focusing on scannability and also to make the screens more flexible to future features. The new home screen, shown below, not only generated positive reaction through the users, but also helped increasing overall income in 7% ($1.750 out of $25.000).
The new screens, released in April 2024.
Cittamobi's team keep working to improve the experience with public transport in Brazil. This particular segment has issues related to urban planning and public infraestructure, but good technology can help improving the lives of the daily commuters.