Following up on my earlier post related to the pains and gains the end user may face using the Smart Parking Grid Application, here is an actual persona pain/gain map.
What does a bad day look like?
A bad day could consist of a few different scenarios. For a businessperson, a bad day could start with being late to a meeting due to being unable to find a parking spot nearby. For a vacationer, it could be a woman looking to go shopping on a rainy day and unable to find a spot near the shops. In both cases, neither may even have any spare change in their rental cars to pay the meter!
What are they afraid of?
I think both the businessperson and the vacationer are afraid of not knowing their way around a new city. Parking is only one part of the picture. It may be difficult enough to find a destination, imagine not being able to find parking as well. Now imagine you find that parking spot but it is a few blocks over and it is snowing or raining and you need to find your way back to your destination?
What keeps them awake at night?
I am going to skip over the vacationer for this since there shouldn't be much causing that kind of stress while on vacation. For the businessperson, they could be stressed out trying to meet deadlines, preparing for a big presentation, or stressed over a heavy workload.
What are they responsible for?
The businessperson could be responsible for a number things while on the road. They could be there to convert a sale, or to maintain a customer relationship, or just to attend an important meeting. The vacationer is likely only responsible for ensuring their family is enjoying themselves.
What obstacles stand in their way?
Both face the same obstacles: traffic, lack of familiarity with the area, parking issues, and the weather.
What do these people want and aspire to?
The businessperson likely wants this to be as efficient and smooth as possible. Contrary to popular belief, business travel is not all fun and games. It can be a very stressful experience. The vacationer just wants to enjoy themselves without having to deal with the stress they face at home. If they live in a city, they already spend enough of their lives dealing with the typical city problem.
How does these people measure success?
The businessperson measures success by how trip went. Do they make the sale? Did they lock up an account? Did they get a good deal? The vacationer measures success by the level of enjoyment they experience during the vacation.
What can we offer these people?
Peace of mind. More enjoyable experiences navigating the city. One less thing to worry about. The Smart Parking Grid Application allows each to find and reserve a metered parking spot and pay using a direct debit from a bank account using their mobile devices.
Interesting concept, one thing you could expand on is when your system directs a client to a vacant spot; you could feature routes that would minimize delays by construction or other traffic inputs as well. You pointed out that parking was just one stressor to getting to that important meeting, dodging that plugged-up one way narrow street construction at rush hour could help a lot as well. This may be possible if you are coordinating this with the city as well.
ReplyDeleteMy question about this product is that given that Boston has a very robust infrastructure for public transportation (trains, cabs, buses) how would this product penetrate and catch on with business travelers and tourists?
ReplyDeleteDo you know what the approximate split is between renting a car and just taking cabs everywhere?