Invest In Your Digital Solutions
PLAN FOR SUCCESS
Custom digital solutions like websites and mobile apps are important investments. If your company does (or plans to do) the majority of its business online, then your digital solution should be your MOST important investment. These digital solutions are often the most common sales tool a customer interacts with for gathering information, making purchases and scheduling services. When it comes time to updating a website or creating a new application, there are a lot of unknowns to uncover before jumping into the design and development stages. Having a clearly defined path to follow throughout the project will ensure the website or mobile app is successful. That clearly defined path comes from investing in the time and resources to truly understand the desired outcome.
MAPPING THE JOURNEY
Creating a custom digital solution is a lot like taking a road trip. You have a Point A and Point B, and the efficiency of the journey depends on research and data. Say you’re driving from Chicago to New York and you’re so excited to leave that you decide to figure it out as you go. You know the general direction you need to go is east. But just because you have a general idea of the journey doesn’t mean it will be the most efficient use of your time. Suddenly you’re driving through middle of nowhere Ohio and really wishing you would’ve taken the time to look at a map before leaving. Once arriving in New York, you realize the drive took 2 days longer than it would have if you’d mapped out the journey.
Jumping straight into the design and development before having all of the answers is just like road tripping without a determined, efficient route. It is the biggest mistake companies make when starting a digital project, and almost always results in a slow, frustrating and expensive process. But we don’t want our clients’ experience to be painful and slow. So, our solution to answer the unknowns and determine the true goals of a project is the Discover and Scope processes.
DISCOVERING THE UNKNOWN
Think of the Discover process as investing in your digital assets. By going through the process you are ensuring the project is done correctly and efficiently, with all of the initial questions answered and possible solutions considered. The findings we collect during the Discover phase guide our recommendations for all phases of the project. The Discover process allows us to gain a deeper understanding of your goals and current processes by discussing pain points, brainstorming areas of improvement, reviewing analytics reports and determines whether current assumptions of the project problem and solutions are accurate or not.. After compiling all of the data, we use it to define user personas and create user journey maps to ensure what we build is user-focused. Moreover, this research is the foundation of our UX, UI, and content strategies.
PROJECT SCOPE
Once we finish organizing the data collected during the Discover process, we move to the next phase: Scope. This phase of the project defines the order in which we complete your comprehensive “wish list” of features, reduces the number of assumptions and creates a unified vision moving forward through development. We prioritize your features backlog based on the expected outcome and required effort to make sure we start with the features that will have the greatest impact on your business. With this information we choose our technologies and carefully document the technical scope of your project. The technical scope will comprise our recommendations to implement and manage each feature. Our research and your requirements dictate what is included in the technical scope, so you know the exact functionality of the digital solution we are creating for your business.
You will receive the findings from the Discover phase and recommendations from the Scope phase in a detailed document so you know exactly how we will proceed with the project.
DEVELOPMENTAL ADVANTAGE
The Development team has the task of bringing the project to life. And without a clear path to follow, that task quickly becomes difficult and confusing for everyone involved. By following the Discover and Scope process, the Development team is able to obtain a thorough understanding of the technical requirements and organization of the project and develop a full picture of possible solutions that align with the values of the project. Ryan Thompson, Lead Terrostar Developer, said “We’ve been able to abstract more of the project ahead of time through documentation of the Discover process findings, from a technical developer’s perspective. Aside from flushing out the ill-fitting/preconceived ideas about the project that could have derailed it before release, we also already modeled many of the moving parts and pieces involved in the application.”
PROCESS IN ACTION
Current Terrostar clients who have completed the Discover and Scope phases understand the value provided by this process. Minute Suites, a specialized hotel chain located inside some of the nation’s largest airports, recently completed the Discover and Scope phases in preparation for a brand new, custom mobile app. Throughout the Discover process, we uncovered vital information about potential problems with a third party vendor. We were able to find a new solution that kept the project timeline efficient and on track before starting the app development. When asked about the process and its deliverables, Peter Britt, CFO, said he’s “Excited, cautiously optimistic” and “[I’m] very impressed with everything I’ve seen from Terrostar so far.”
Interested in learning more about how our Discover and Scope phases can elevate your digital assets? Contact us today!
By Christina Maxwell