Design a mobile application to assist hobby gardeners.

Clarification

1. Any specific geographies

Assumption- India, there is a high scope due to scale in population, high pollution in the tier 1 and tier 2 cities, People has lot of resources in village areas but they do not have awareness on gardening

2. Gardening means only flower gardening or fruit gardening, fruit farms etc

Assumption- Lets assume it is flower gardening

User Segment

1. Experienced and nascent stage hobby gardeners who wants to pursue gardening

2.  Suppliers like nurseries, medicines/chemical suppliers, land leasing

3. Government entities who promotes gardening under government run schemes/subsidies

I would like to chose first user segment nasent stage and experienced hobby gardeners for this use case considering in India one of the key challenge for low rate hobby gardening is unawareness and disinterest due certain deep rooted challenges that makes it more difficult. Hence, the user  look over other alternatives to pursue hobby instead of gardening.

Pain Points

1.  Poor understanding on the plant breeds and and how to nurture them in the right weather

2. Unavailibity of experts at the right time who can advise right chemicals and medicines for growth and plant sickness cause demotivation

3. Unawareness of the government run schemes and long tedious process to procure lease land and supplies at a very very reasonable cost

4. Hobby gardening also incurs cost which might not be affordable by everyone in the society

5. In the fast pace working life people have very limited time to spend over gardening. Gardening is an activity that needs consistent efforts and time.

I would like to prioritise paint 1 and 3 for this use case considering people love to do gardening and have been doing it in limited/small space in thier residential apartments but due to above challenges can't scale up or gets demotivated/disinterested easily.

Solutions

1. Online training courses can be provided to educate the inexperienced hobby gardeners

2. Experienced gardeners can avail advance cources which short in tenure but targetting to specific areas like how to scale gardening in speceifc season, region specifc advices to scale the output and improve the gardening exeperience

3. Online booking of desired plants based on the profile matcch of gardeners where tthe system can suggest them the right plants based on user profile info like region, season, land area, soil etc. We can also provide quick home delivery witth online paymennt option

4. Live chat sessions and posting threads to the experts which can be answered in near real time or within a turn around time with an ability to upload plan soil photographs to advice any chemicals etc for plant sickness

5. Online booking of experts who can visit the garden area advice and execute gardening atleast for few days to help the hobby gardeners

6. Creating communities to share the outcome in the group.

7. To check region wise government schemes and if the user is qualified for the same then it should allow online processing for the same with required formalities.

8. Status check feature if the user is qualified/eligible to avail and government schemes

9. A dashboard where a user can track the growth of gardening by entering few key details like numbers of plants raised over the period of time, plants damaged, survived etc

Prioritisation

I would like to prioritise solution 1, 3, 7 based based on the customer reach, complexity and business value. It will not only easy the job of hobby gardeners but also helps them to scale up the activity while saving time rather doing it in an unstrcutured way without application. This in turn will also create more interest towards hobby gardening.

When I think of hobby gardeners, a whole spectrum of people comes to mind. People who want to start gardening, people who already have a few house plants and want to learn to care for them, are already good gardeners and want to learn new forms of gardening such as Bonsai or learn to care for exotic plants. The spectrum of skills amongst hobbyists is vast, and each level needs different types of assistance. To build a mobile app for hobbyists, I’d first start with the following questions

Clarifying questions:

1.      What exactly do we mean when we say assist gardeners? Is it reminders on caring for their plants or assistance to broaden the user’s skillset?

2.      What kind of a business is funding this project? Are we a gardening supplies business building an app to help sales, or a technology firm looking to create something for gardeners?

3.      Are we looking to monetize the App by giving ad space to gardening supply companies?

4.      Are there apps for other hobbies that have been researched and gained success?

Product scoping:

Given the broad spectrum of potential users, I am looking to build an app useful for all gardening skills levels. Users could range from ones who have just acquired their first plant to botanical experts. However, for the sake of this discussion, I’d like to consider features most useful for people who are very new to the hobby.

User Requirement:

-          Plant identification

-          Choosing the right plant for skill level and geography

-          Procuring their first plant

-          Procuring other supplies

-          Care reminders

-          Community participation

-          Tracking the health of the plant

-          Theme suggestions

Solutions:

1.      Plant Identification: An essential feature for any hobbyist would be identifying a plant they saw and liked. With ML, it is possible to take a leaf picture to identify the plant it belongs to. While a database already exists, it is also possible to crowdsource this information to make the database bigger. When users are interested in a plant they have seen somewhere, easy access to information about the plant will increase their interest and knowledge base.

2.      Choosing the right plant: with millions of varieties, each requiring different conditions, picking the first part can be a challenge. Giving new users suggestions on which plant they can choose depending on their location and skill level will ensure users can take care of their plant and enjoy their hobby.

3.      Procuring the first plant: By having the right kind of business associations, the App can provide a service to allow users to get their first kit. This kit can contain the sapling or seed they want to grow, beginner gardening tools, instructions on how to care for it, supplies such as fertilizer, and more, everything required to start a garden. Packages of this sort will ensure that users work with the right supplies to have a maximum chance of success.

4.      Procuring supplies: Once a user is underway gardening, they will need to replenish their supplies; having an in-app store to order these supplies can bring a revenue stream to the App.

5.      Care reminders: This is one essential feature of the App. Instructions on how to care for their plants. House plants often die not due to neglect but over caring, too much water, too much fertilizer, not enough sunlight. Having care instructions in the database will remind the user how to care for their plant. These instructions can also be passed on as notifications: ‘Add 200ml of water to the rose plant’ and ‘add NPK to the basil.’

6.      Virtual garden: The user can upload all the plants they have to the App, and the App can create a consolidated care plan for them.

7.      Community participation: As is with most hobbies, communities thrive around them. Plant communities can be built by allowing members to share pictures of their plants, pose questions, and participate in discussions. These communities can have initiatives like plant swap, learning series, etc

8.      Tracking the health of the plant: Similar to plant identification ML can be deployed to find out the health of the plant and if it needs different care

9.      Garden themes: After getting their first plant, people might want to have a theme to their garden such as microgreens, flowers, house plants, cacti etc. The App can have a few themes set up so that users can graduate from caring for a plant to starting a garden.

In the prioritization queue, the items marked as a medium priority as while these are great to have, they are broader features that are are not exactly assistance. Once the first version of the App is out, looking at reception and user research, these can be added in over the next iterations.

Metrics

#DAU: number of users on the app every day

#Plant identification queries: to measure user engagement

#Users who set up care reminders

Sales Revenue: when procurement services are built-in

Risks:

Caring for plants is a lot of work, and an app that is so feature-rich might overwhelm hobbyists who might lose interest.

People may not be looking for more features than reminders on when to water their plants and when to add fertilizers, and other features may not get used very often. Maybe a simple and light version which does only that might succeed better

If sales are introduced, the right business model needs to be implemented to support it. Lack of support on sale might turn users away.