TELUS
MOBILE APP STRATEGY
Mobile App · Strategy · App Ecosystem · Telecommunications · Research
A Friendlier Future
In a world perpetually becoming more connected and complex, people are demanding more of their technology and services. I worked with TELUS, a core telecommunications provider in Canada, to better serve their customers by transforming their mobile app ecosystem with a focus on their My Account Utility app. We created a strategic vision, roadmap, governance system and creative concept.
To comply with my confidentiality agreement I have omitted and appropriated confidential information. These designs are a reinterpretation of the original.
Monumental Shifts
We were approached to answer the question, “where should we take our app ecosystem in three years?” In answering this, we provided an understanding of the role of the app, recommendations to the ecosystem, guidelines to manage the evolving app environment, and a creative conceptualisation of the vision.
This was a massive undertaking over a six month period that included stakeholder meetings and workshops with 50+ team members, a review of 100+ documents, and the development of strategic recommendations. After an intense deep dive, gaps were identified in integration, branding, nomenclature, design, and development practices throughout the TELUS app ecosystem.
My Role
As a UX designer at No Fixed Address Inc, my role included:
Consumer research and competitive insights that shaped the core app strategy
Development of the future ecosystem roadmap
Contributions to strategic and governance recommendations
Participation in the design of the creative concept
This involved working closely with our internal UX team, strategists, product owners, project managers and creative team; product managers and stakeholders from TELUS; and UX leads from their partner agency.
The Exploration
After we reached alignment with stakeholders on gaps, goals and outputs, I contributed towards a trends analysis to anticipate shifts in relevance. The goal was to understand where consumer expectations are headed, where the industry will be investing its digital efforts, and where mobile technology is evolving.
Landscape
I also carried out a landscape analysis to comprehend how the competitive landscape is shifting in order to offer more support and service opportunities. This included a competitive audit where global comparable brands were identified to discover elements such as common features, innovative functionalities, and customer reviews/ratings.
Part of the global review of competitor’s app ecosystems.
Best In Class
As part of the analysis we reviewed global, best-in-class app ecosystems to understand patterns in architecture, usability, product offerings and how applications may or may not work together. The insights from these exercises shaped the core strategy, governance guidelines and recommendations to the TELUS ecosystem.
A mapping of navigational pathways between Google’s App ecosystem!
Design Governance
Using insights from the landscape analysis, I assisted in devising governance guidelines to help TELUS manage their ecosystem. The proper planning of all new product and support apps along with app feature upgrades must be governed in order to ensure there is a holistic digital TELUS experience.
We dove into how leading and competitor app ecosystems to uncover patterns and best practices.
Roadmap
To begin building the roadmap for the My Account app and future ecosystem, our team audited the features and functionality of the current suite of TELUS apps to interpret the role they play. Based on collective insights from the analyses and audits, we proposed a roadmap that included a new ecosystem structure. The proposed structure comprised changes to the ecosystem such as keeping, merging and dissolving current, work in progress, and future applications while also considering how each component rolls out into a thirty six month roadmap.
For the utility app, we recommended features and functionality that would take the My Account app closer to the strategic vision. I helped run and lead workshops with stakeholders where we brainstormed features and functions and aided their team in reprioritising their feature backlog. Insights from these workshops and the landscape analysis were then used to devise the creative concept called the My TELUS app.
An snapshot into a features prioritisation workshop with stakeholders and team members.
Conceptualisation
To begin conceptualising a 'blue sky thinking’ utility app, workshops were held with TELUS stakeholders and a design team from their partner agency. We collaborated on a design direction and brainstormed features and functions that worked towards the strategic vision. I worked closely with our UX and creative teams to bring this to life in the creation of the My TELUS creative concept and video.
A quick, digital mockup of the prototype flow.
The Results
With a fresh understanding of the role of the app, TELUS is now incorporating the strategic vision across their app environment. This resulted in changes to the ecosystem structure, updates to their app iconography and naming conventions based on new governance guidelines, and the implementation of features, functionality, and UI shifts in the newly rebranded My TELUS application.
