Triply
A sustainable booking app.
Triply is a user-friendly and sustainable booking app designed to help users make sustainable travel choices. The concept enables planning trips that benefit the planet and local communities.
A digital platform that makes sustainable travel easy.
Project overview
With increasing global awareness of climate change and environmental sustainability, there is a demand for travel options that have the least possible environmental impact. However, planning sustainable travel can be complicated.
Triply is a concept that responds to the growing complexity of sustainable travel. Our solution is a user-friendly and sustainable booking platform that allows users to compare and book eco-friendly flights and accommodations, preview carbon emissions, and access educational articles and local travel tips. The design is rooted in compelling UX principles, with features like sustainability rankings, interactive zone maps, and social proof to support behavioral change.
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Triply – A sustainable booking app.
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Noroff (educational project).
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4 weeks (november/december 2024).
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UX/UI/Graphic designer with an eye for detail. Ensured that the presentation looks visually engaging.
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Kristina Klafstad
Caroline. O. Hufthammer
Karen. O. KivircikThe UX team has collaborated closely throughout the whole Design Thinking Process – researching, ideating and making decisions together to ensure satisfactory results.
Each member has contributed across all tasks, and brought unique strengths to the project.
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Figma, FigJam
Problem
Travelers are struggling to prioritize sustainability at the same level as cost, efficiency and comfort when planning trips because they lack clear sustainable information and affordable options.
Challange
The challenge was to design a user-friendly platform that not only supports sustainable choices, but also educates and motivates users – without overwhelming them.
Solution
By solving the problem, we will have a positive impact on our users, local communities, the environment and the planet. We created Triply – a digital booking platform that helps users plan sustainable transport, accommodation and activities.
The design thinking process
Empathize
Understand users and their needs in order to create a useful and user-friendly product.
Define
Define our potential users and what they need to prioritize sustainability when traveling.
Ideate
Explore ideas and create a sustainable concept that matches users' needs & goals.
Prototype
Transform ideas into visual layouts, focusing on structure and functionality.Test
Identify issues, understand user behavior, gather feedback to improve the experience.Empathize
In the empathize phase – the first order of business was researching sustainable travel to familiarize ourselves on the topic and get to know our users and their needs. To get a solid foundation, we used qualitative and quantitative data collection methods. Both secondary and primary research was conducted in the form of literature reviews, competitive and SWOT analyses, as well as interviews and a survey, and we utilized generative, exploratory, and evaluative research.
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High-priority:
Who are the users and stakeholders looking to make traveling more ecofriendly?
What do users prioritize most when traveling, and what do they need to prioritize sustainability?
Why do users choose to travel sustainably, and how important is it to them?Low-priority:
When do users need guidance about sustainability?
Where do users currently find information about sustainable travel?
How can we create a solution to help guide travelers towards choosing sustainable options?
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We used a holistic approach to achieve our research goals.
Literature review
Eighteen sources in total.
Gain general knowledge from online articles on the topic of sustainable travel and tourism, in order to find a starting point to base the rest of our research upon.Competitive analysis
Four direct competitors and four indirect.Evaluate potential competitors’ strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats to identify market gaps and possible offerings.
User interviews
Five participants recruited from list of friends/family.To gather first-hand qualitative data to identify needs, goals, motivations, frustrations, pain-points and impressions of potential users.
Survey
90 individual respondents.To gather a larger set of numeric data to back up our findings from previous research methods.
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Who?
Millennials and Gen X are the most concerned with sustainable traveling. Gen Z are most vocal about the subject, but fail to match their actions to their words.What?
Users prioritize the cost of traveling most when planning or booking a trip. Most people aren’t concerned with their environmental impact while traveling – with only a few naming it their top priority.Why?
Across all ages and genders, price is the dominating concern when it comes to choosing more sustainable travel options. The lack of clear information, options, and sustainable labeling are common pain-points.When?
People want information on sustainable travel.This is especially true for women planning trips. A big percentage of people say they need guidance, particularlyon sustainable accommodations and activities.Where?
We’ve discovered that women prefer to source several platforms for information and options when planning their trips, while men favor simple, convenient booking platforms that focus on cost-effectiveness. -
How?
With our research in mind, we found several opportunities to create a solution that could help users make more sustainable decisions while traveling, such as a booking app with:Smart filters for sustainable travel, accommodations, transportation, and activities.
Clear labeling and NGOS certification on sustainable alternatives.
CO₂ calculator/CO₂ emission labels that are understandable to users, to promote transparency.
Use of incentives such as personal reward/point systems and/or discounts.
Promoting eco-friendly travel packages for a discounted price.
Notifications for sustainable traveling tips/ticket sales, before and during the trip
Feedback system to offer users the ability to rate/review alternatives.
Clear educational info about sustainable travel and tourism.
Personalized recommendations based on user priorities, such as cost or environmental certifications.
Ranking systems ranking companies from least to most sustainable.
Define
Based on the research collected during the empathize stage, we developed a vision and problem statement. With the problem defined and our vision in mind, we used our findings to construct the primary persona and a user scenario – based on needs, goals, motivations and pain points. This guided us throughout the project.
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Who is experiencing the problem: Travelers.
What is the problem:
Lack of knowledge, trustworthy information and clear labeling makes it difficult to travel sustainably.Where does the problem present itself:
When planning and booking a trip.Why does it matter:
Tourism and traveling can have an overall negative effect on the global environment, as well as local communities and economies. -
Travelers are struggling to prioritize sustainability at the same level as cost, efficiency and comfort when planning trips because they lack clear sustainable information and affordable options. By solving this issue, it would positively impact our users, local societies, and the environment by remaining eco-friendly and giving back to otherwise exploited communities. At the same time, it would separate us from our competitors, effectively increasing engagement and loyalty for our business.
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Nora Nilsen
“I care about the environment. But do I focus on it a lot? I don't. But I try to make good choices so that I don't pollute the environment.”
Age: 44
Occupation: Nurse
Family: Divorced, 2 children (18 & 21)
Location: Bergen, Norway
Devices: Macbook, iPad, iPhoneEco-friendly • Adventurous • Cost-conscious • Lacks knowledge.
Bio
I am a 44 year old divorced nurse from Bergen with two adult children. I have many interests, like learning about new cultures and visiting museums, but I also enjoy beach vacations, dancing and hiking. Affordability and comfort are my top priotities, and I’m passionate about traveling eco-friendly, but I sometimes struggle to find cost-effective sustainable options and clear information about sustainability in general.Aside from being aware of CO₂ emissions from planes, I don’t know much about how to make my trips more sustainable. Prioritizing sustainability while remaining true to my budget is hard, and I don’t trust the eco-friendly labels currently circulating. I need trustworthy information and tools to help me plan and book my trips and activities, and I would like rewards for choosing sustainable options.
Personality
More low salary then high salary.
More tech-savvy then technophobic.
More busy then time rich.
In between lavish then stingy.
More indifferent then eco-conscious.
More social then anti-social.
More planner then go-with-the-flow.
More well-traveled then unexploring.Motivations
Cost, impact, experience, relaxation, culture, eco-friendly, rewards, shame.Goals
Planning budget-friendly and eco-conscious vacations. Reduce the environmental impact of her travel choices. Learn about new cultures and places sustainably. Plan and enjoy sustainable vacation activities.
Get clear information on sustainable travel.
Travel comfortably and efficiently.
Stay in central accommodations.
Pain points
Cost: Sustainable travel options are more expensive/impractical. Guidance: Nora lacks guidance to find eco-friendly alternatives.
Labels: Environmental certifications are hardly visible.
Availability: Too few options are sustainable.
Information: Nora lacks information on sustainability.
Habits: Eco-friendly habits are easy to forget when traveling.
Transport: Public transport is hard to navigate when traveling.
Needs and expectations
Travels for leisure.
Buys tickets/accommodation on booking sites.
Leaves sustainable habits at home while traveling. Prefers booking trips on a computer.
Likes to plan/customize trips to her needs and preferences. Travels 2-4 times a year.
Prioritizes the cheapest traveling option.
Chooses the shortest, most direct route.
Uses google to find information.
Carries out small sustainable actions while traveling. Does research on the destination before traveling.
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Nora is planning a girl’s trip and is in charge of booking flight tickets for all the girls. She opens Triply , our sustainable travel app, to look for inspiration. Her eye is drawn to the “Sustainable Travel Destinations” section on the home page. Brilliant , she thinks. While scrolling through the suggested destinations, Nora pictures herself in all the places. An option peaks her interest- it’s both cheap and eco-friendly. Curious , Nora clicks on the option and reads about the location and its culture. It’s a perfect fit for me and the girls , she thinks. She decides to go for it, and books the tickets.
As she’s booking the tickets, Nora notices the “Your Environmental Impact” section on the page. Intrigued, she looks through the section, noting all the ways her trip will impact the environment. I didn’t even know haggling was bad, Nora thinks. She’s puzzled, but feels relieved to have read about it before visiting. Curious, she decides to press the “Read More” button to learn more.
After booking the plane tickets, Nora wants to look at places to stay in the area. She decides to do a general search on the destination, and is pleasantly surprised to find that Triply recommends accommodation. Taking a closer look, Nora sees that all the options are labeled according to their level of sustainability. Happy as a clam, she clicks on the most sustainable option to have a read. The hotel is locally owned, has a 4,8 star review with breakfast included – Nora is sold. This is perfect, she thinks, and presses the “Share” button to send it to her girls. She is so excited for her trip now!
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Our vision is to create an intuitive global solution to make sustainability a matter-of-fact for travelers and companies alike.
Ideate
In the third stage of the design thinking process, we utilized the insights gathered in the Empathize and Define stages to explore different ideas and create a sustainable app concept that aligns with our users’ needs and goals.
Before embarking on the ideation process, we created five “How Might We” (HMW) questions to guide our workshop. We brainstormed and mind mapped three top ideas/concepts: a carbon footprint app, a sustainable transport app, and a sustainable booking app & website, and employed dot-voting to vote for the favorite concept; A sustainable booking app & website.
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…make sustainable tourism and travel more appealing to people?
…motivate people to choose and prioritize sustainable options without compromising their existing needs?
…educate people about their societal and environmental impact with clear, reliable information about sustainability?
…create a digital product that minimizes planning and simplifies the booking experience?
…instill in people a habit to carry out small sustainable actions and keep sustainability in their minds?
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Brainstorming
Affinity mapping
Mind mapping
Dot voting
The chosen concept
Triply – A sustainable booking app & website
A booking site with a focus on sustainable travel as a whole, allowing users to book sustainable flights and accommodations, all in one app. The concept is compatible with mobile and desktop to suit our users’ preferences. However, we’ve decided to go for a mobile-first approach – displaying how this concept looks as an iPhone app initially.
Main features:
Booking feature for both transport and accommodations.
Only displays sustainable booking options.
Sustainability rankings, carbon emission preview, and eco-labeling on all flights and accommodations.
Information section with articles on sustainable traveling and tourism, tips & tricks, local communities and culture, and safety precautions.
An interactive zone map, color-coded to show which locations in the world are affected by overtourism, and which are sustainably safe to travel to.
Concept map
Concept sketches
Prototype
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Prototype •
Prototype
This stage of the Design Thinking Process transformed ideas into visual layouts, focusing on structure and functionality. Wireframing bridges the gap between a concept and the start of a well-defined digital product. The wireframes help us to better understand the hierarchy and and layout of our sustainable booking app & website. To sketch wireframes of the top idea/concept, we first made a spreadsheet of requirements, the information architecture, and UX flows. The wireframes provided us with an outline of the concept, of which we could implement design principles and guidelines that focused on general usability and layout on. We digitalized the wireframes, and constructed wireflows based on the UX flows, bringing life to prototypes to employ in usability testing.
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We created digital versions of our hand-drawn sketches in Figma to easily refine the designs as we define our requirements, IA and UX flows.
The sketches give us a clearer picture of what the product’s layout should look like, and allows for efficient design iterations along the way.
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Low-fidelity wireframing
The following wireframes and wireflows are based on our requirements, MoSCoW, IA and UX flows. Each wireframe aligns with Noras needs and incorporates core design principles and patterns.
Our goals
Design a user friendly and intuitive app for users to easily navigate to their goals.
Optimize findability and usability in the app by providing clear filter and search functions.
Educate users about sustainable travel clearly and effectively, with concise language and labelling.
Ensure that the app is accessible with a clean looking interface, free of distracting functions, by using contemporary design principles, patterns and best practices.
Use design principles to influence users’ traveling habits and their knowledge onsustainable travel.
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After sketching the requirements, IA and UX flows, we gained a better understanding of what we wanted the layout and design of the app to look like.
As we’d already made digital sketches in Figma, it was easy to adjust them to meet the requirements and address the problems we encountered in the UX flows.
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We created three wireflows for this project, all based on the task and user flows.
They visualize how users navigate through our app and communicate our design decisions along with navigational paths, while helping us identify possible weaknesses in our design. The flows are designed to take users through a variety of navigational points in the app:
Wireflow 1: Find destination (POI) on Zones map – One of the features in the app is an interactive map of sustainable and not-so-sustainable locations in the world. This flow illustrates how users can utilize the map to find a destination that is sustainable.
Wireflow 2: Booking flight – This flow showcases the function of our booking form, and illustrates how a user can fill this form to book their desired flight.
Wireflow 3: Filtered search – A large part of a booking app is tailored to helping the user easily find information and items they want. This flow displays the filter and search features, and will help us improve their functions. It can also help to identify what filtering options users feel are missing.
Wireflow 1
Find destination (POI) on Zones map
Wireflow 2
Booking flight/accommodation
Wireflow 3
Filtered search
Test
Test tasks & scenarios
At the final stage of the design thinking process, usability testing, we test drived our prototypes with real users to see how our digital product really works. The goal of testing was to identify usability issues, understand user behavior, and gather valuable feedback and insights to improve the overall experience. Usability testing gathered feedback on our app from folks who matched our primary persona. We tested three task flows, and the results varied; the first task had poorer ratings and more wrong clicks, while the second task had the best results. We found eight points to improve the usability of our product. Some could easily be changed, while some require new rounds of sketching and testing, and will be addressed in the next steps. The booking form was well received, and users found the sustainable labeling to be clear. Ultimately, the results proved that users like the app concept and would consider using it.
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What to test
Ease of navigation and usability of booking and interactive map features.
Usability of search function and filters.
Clarity of labels and headlines.
Natural workflows and design layout.
Findability of content.
Why we test
Ensure that users’ needs and goals are met effectively.
Collect insights of the overall user experience.
Identify pain-points and faults.
Collect suggestions for iterations.
Collect opinions on product concept.
How we test
Remote
Moderated
Scripted
Session recordings
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Participant 1
Male 41, Bergen
work, partner, one child, travel for work & pleasure.Participant 2
Male 39, Bergen
work, married, two children, travel for work & pleasure.Participant 3
Female 43, Bergen
work, married, three children, travel for work & pleasure.Participant 4
Female 39, Bergen
work, married, two children, travel for pleasure.We screened participants to ensure that they match with our target audience and our primary persona, Nora.
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The usability test has three tasks to complete, all formulated as scenarios to make it easier for the participants to understand what is asked of them. The tasks are focused on how a user can locate a sustainable destination, book a flight, and use the search and filter functions to find accommodation. Each of the tasks have following questions and ratings to clarify participants’ opinions.
Task & task flow 1:
The user must locate and save a location from a green zone.This task is closed and the user can only use the Zones button to find a location.
Scenario
“You want to travel more sustainably, but are struggling to find a location that isn’t affected by overtourism. Use the Zones map to find and save a location in the green zone.”Task & task flow 2:
The user must book a flight using the flight form.This task is closed and the user can only use the form displayed on the home page.
Scenario
“You’ve decided to travel to Lisbon, and you want to book a flight. Since you’re concerned about your environmental impact, you want to pick an eco-friendly option. Fill all the fields in the form to locate and book the most sustainable flight.”Task & task flow 3:
The user must use the search bar filter to find an accommodationThis task is closed and the user can only use the search bar filter to locate accommodation.
Scenario
“You want to find accommodation for your Lisbon trip. You’re concerned about the cost and the environment. Use the search bar and filter to find the most sustainable hotel for under 1000kr.” -
Moderate + remote
Recorded video/audio
Scripted
Think Aloud
Task & task flow 1:
The user must locate and save a location from a green zone.
This task is closed and the user can only use the Zones button to find a location.
Scenario
“You want to travel more sustainably, but are struggling to find a location that isn’t affected by overtourism. Use the Zones map to find and save a location in the green zone.”
Task & task flow 2:
The user must book a flight using the flight form.
This task is closed and the user can only use the form displayed on the home page.
Scenario
“You’ve decided to travel to Lisbon, and you want to book a flight. Since you’re concerned about your environmental impact, you want to pick an eco-friendly option. Fill all the fields in the form to locate and book the most sustainable flight.”
Task & task flow 3:
The user must search and filter to find an accommodation
This task is closed and the user can only use the search bar filter to locate accommodation.
Scenario
“You want to find accommodation for your Lisbon trip. You’re concerned about the cost and the environment. Use the search bar and filter to find the most sustainable hotel for under 1000kr.”
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Task 1 – zone map
The Zone map was a relatively unknown feature.
Prototype map didn’t function like intended, and caused some irritation amongst the participants.
Participants gave the concept as a whole a solid thumbs up – stating that they enjoyed finding sustainable destinations this way.
Task 2 – Book a flight
High satisfaction rate.
The only perceivable downsides were the pre-filled form fields, which caused some mild confusion.
The flight booking process was found to be intuitive and user-friendly.
Participants instinctively used the tabs confirming this as the primary method for finding lodging and bookings
Task 3 – Search & filter accommodation
Users went straight for the Accommodation tab – presumably out of habit.
When participants finally got the hint and used the search bar, the task went over smoothly and seemed satisfactory.
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Design improvements
The usability testing garnered valuable user insights to take into account when implementing design improvements to our wireframes. We found several recommended iterations that would improve the efficiency and usability of our product significantly.
Zones information card
The back and save button were moved to the top of the page to make them more noticable for users.
A share button was added per user request to be able to share locations with others.
A book button was added to make the process of booking more efficient.
A home button was added to the bottom bar to streamline navigation.
Booking flight
Search button was moved and enlarged to make it more intuitive and visible for users.
Filter button was added underneath the search button to accommodate user needs.
Old
New
Old
New
Old
New
Search & filter accomodation
More filter options were added to familiarize and improve the overall filter experience for users.
Next steps
The next steps in this project include revisiting the IA and sketching new wireframes, and then creating new UX flows that focus on the insights we gained with user testing- like the need for a low-price calendar and a price/sustainability comparing function. These two new functions alone contribute immensely to increase recognition and usability of the app. The Zone map needs iterating to act more intuitively and mimic other interactive maps, and pages like My trips and Info need to be prototyped- before starting a new round of user testing. Considering Triply is intended to function on both mobile and desktop to meet users’ expectations, the natural next phase in this process is to create digitalized versions of the desktop wireframes, along with an IA, UX flows, and task scenarios to prepare for usability testing and further iterations.