PLAPP
An appointment and client organisation and booking app designed specifically for creatives, offering simplicity and ease of use.
Tasks
Research
UX UI Design Branding Prototyping Usability Testing Marketing
Focus
AI
Organisation apps Clear UX
2023
Problem
Tattoo artists and other creative freelancers often face challenges in managing bookings, client communication, and organization. This can take away from their focus on creative work. To solve this, Plapp is designed to simplify these tasks, specifically targeting the needs of tattoo artists to help them spend less time on admin and more time on their art.
OUR SOLUTIONS :
Automated AI assistant
Plapp will receive and reacts to emails from your costumers.
Request summary card. Plapp will extract the information from the costumer request and will organise it in a comfortable card format.
The artist can add their personal notes to keep track and important information about the appointment
Type of request, informs about the project before reading the description.
Colour coded appointment distinction for better organisation.
Easy to manage Costumer canvas
Find all the information about your upcoming appointments in the costumer canvas.
After receiving the deposit the appointment is confirmed.
the artist can find all the information about the appointment and prepare for it.
By clicking on the appointment the artist can find the “costumer canvas”
Appointment schedule stress-free
The appointments are added automatically to the app calendar
Quick look at the requests allows the user to view and add personal notes about the requests before accepting
Accepting a request will add it automatically to the calendar, and will send the costumer the appointment information and a deposit request.
Coordination between all tools in one place
Your clients can find and contact you on their favourite platform, Plapp will collect and organise them all for you
facebook , email or instagram the requests from all the platforms will appear on one page inside of the app.
The user name and the platform is mentioned with a tag.
Expending the card will show the all the necessarily details for the artist
OUR SOLUTIONS :
Plapp will receive and reacts to emails from your costumers.
Automated AI assistant
Your clients can find and contact you on their favourite platform, Plapp will collect and organise them all for you
Coordination between all tools in one place
Your clients can find and contact you on their favourite platform, Plapp will collect and organise them all for you
Appointment schedule stress-free
Your clients can find and contact you on their favourite platform, Plapp will collect and organise them all for you
Support your creativity with the Costumer canvas
LET’S RESEARCH :
We interviewed 5 tattoo artist with different work volumes about what bothered them the most in their everyday as creative freelancers. The question we asked ourself first of all is:
If they need a solution for the creative process or the logistical organisation.
RESEARCH FINDING :
Irritation ?
Coordinating between many apps
What are the biggest
Planning appointments
Back and forth Emails
Based on our research, we identified several pain points faced by creative freelancers in managing their appointments and workflow. Many creatives find themselves juggling multiple apps and platforms to coordinate schedules, manage emails, and handle back-and-forth communication with clients. This disorganized process often leads to inefficiencies, particularly when it comes to planning appointments, managing invoices, and handling finances. As a result, creatives end up spending too much time on administrative tasks rather than focusing on their actual craft. Additionally, many creatives struggle with finding and using automated solutions that could simplify their processes, leaving them overwhelmed by manual organization.
"In a perfect world I would have an assistant for all the things that aren’t the creation itself, unfortunately I cannot afford one"
COMPETITOR ANALYSIS:
While organisation and booking apps are nothing new, our challenge was to develop a tailored solution specifically for freelance creatives particularly tattoo artists, a rapidly growing and highly profitable industry.
Both Eversports and Vagaro are established in their markets, offering comprehensive booking and management solutions. Eversports focuses on sports and wellness with scheduling, payment integration, and client management features. Vagaro serves the beauty, wellness, and fitness industries, providing online booking, client management, marketing tools, and reporting functions.
What We Can Learn:
The success of Eversports and Vagaro highlights the value of user-friendly, integrated solutions that minimize the administrative burden for businesses, allowing them to focus on their core offerings. These platforms show how creating an all-encompassing experience with streamlined booking processes, client communication, and management tools can drive user adoption and satisfaction.
Why PLAPP is Different ?
While Eversports and Vagaro focus on established industries, Plapp is designed specifically for the rapidly growing sector of freelance creatives, particularly tattoo artists. Plapp builds on the proven strategies of simplifying bookings and client management, but refines them to cater specifically to the unique needs of creatives. Unlike generalist platforms, Plapp includes features tailored to tattoo artists, such as project management for custom designs, storing client preferences, and seamless communication. By focusing on an underserved industry, Plapp not only addresses scheduling but also empowers creatives to manage their workflow more efficiently, letting them focus on their art rather than administrative tasks.
SUMMARY AND RETROSPECTIVE:
After doing a lot of research and work on client and appointment management for creatives,I came to understand the challenges of designing organisational tools.Looking back on the Plapp project, I can break down my key learnings into a few main points:
Starting small and growing
One of the key strategies in developing Plapp was starting small and focusing on a niche industry - creative freelancers, specifically tattoo artists. By tailoring the solution to the unique needs of this group, we could design a product that directly addressed their challenges, gaining a foothold in a specific market.
This approach allowed us to refine the app’s functionality and user experience in a controlled environment. If successful, the product could easily scale to other industries, expanding its reach while maintaining its core strengths. Starting small gave us clarity, focus, and a strong foundation for future growth.
Social media as a research tool
An essential tool in the development of Plapp was the use of a smoke test combined with social media engagement. By releasing early versions of the app’s features and creating a waiting list, we were able to gauge interest on a larger scale and gather insights into user expectations.
This process not only validated the demand for the app but also allowed us to identify the most anticipated features directly from potential users. Including social media as part of our research, rather than just a marketing tool, proved invaluable in shaping the direction of the app.
Deeper competitive research
In recent years, booking and customer-business coordination apps have grown significantly in popularity, with platforms like Class pass, Doctor Lib, Urban Sports Club, Eversports, Vagaro, Miles, and Uber leading the way. While these apps don’t introduce new technological solutions, they rethink the business model of the customer-service provider relationship.
Looking back, we realize that we could have explored this business model perspective in more depth. Instead of only focusing on interface design, we should have analyzed how these successful platforms structure their service offerings and customer interactions. By understanding their business models, we could have drawn further inspiration to enhance Plapp and better align it with emerging trends in the booking industry.
Thank you for reading
IDEATION:
Focusing on the research findings, we wanted to create and app that will focus on:
Friendly to use for people who struggle with organisation
Simplicity
Made for tattoo artists
An actual helper
SMOKE TEST:
One last step before starting to design the app was to test if there was actuality a market for the solutions we offered.
We created a Smoke test - an ad campaign that leads to a Landing page and explains about the features of the app.
At the bottom of the page interested viewers can click on "Get Plapp" button which will add them to a waiting list and notify them when the app is done.
SOCIAL MEDIA:
The Brief
Instagram ad campaign:
as a part of our engagement test we crated an instagram page for PLAPP and started interacting with the community.
Since 90% of the tattoo artist use instagram as their main source for internet presence we thought it would be a great place to promote our app too.
MEMBERSHIP MODEL:
we chose a freemium model for our app.
it was important to us that any size of business could use our platform and choose the membership that fits their budget.
DESIGN SYSTEM:
