Bing Mobile
- 2009 - 2010
- Contractor
My role
User Experience Designer
What I did
- User flows
- Wireframes
- Content Inventory
- Prototypes
- Design mockups
- Asset production
About my time at Bing Mobile
I worked on cross-platform mobile phone apps and mobile web projects; first on the initial Bing iPhone release, and then I became the lead designer for Bing Maps and Directions. My job was to create a great, intuitive experience to allow people to find themselves. In the literal sense, that is. Maps and Directions user flows can be very complex, and the goal is to make it seamless across many tasks.
Different platforms offer different affordances so the Bing experience must make sense from both the Bing experience and the specific phone OS. We had a great user research team so we did a lot of prototype testing as well.
Real-Time Transit for iPhone
It looks like this section of the Bing app hasn't been released yet, but I worked on this very exciting real-time transit app for iPhone. My favorite way to describe the problem space was to reenact that sort of head-bobbing, weaving-in-your-seat thing you have to do on a bus or subway to try to see out the window if you've reached or missed your stop (I can act it out for you when we meet in person).
The answer? Riders can watch stops pass in real time, at ease in their seat (or crammed in between tall people with no hope of seeing out the window). We partnered with the UW student who designed and built the impressive One Bus Away app to also design quick-access "where's my bus" features, as well as route and stop information. I REALLY, REALLY hope they add this to the app, or release it as a stand-alone app soon.
Side note: As I worked at Bing mobile, I noticed that they had a lot of great verticals in their apps, but it was hard for users to find them. Also, it was hard for Bing to compete with dedicated competitors in each vertical space. Case in point: no one will be able to effectively use the "where's my bus" feature unless they can get to it with one (maybe two) clicks. I did an exercise in which I analyzed all of the verticals, then grouped them and provided app shortcuts, or back doors, to some of the deeper features, such as Real-Time Transit, Turn-by-Turn Navigation, and third-party partnerships like Open Table. Hopefully, they implement that as well.
Maps and Directions for iPhone
Also not implemented yet is the improved Maps and Directions experience for iPhone. We took the existing experience, improved the colors (for instance, the route now looks like a blue highlighter instead of a fat, opaque map-obscuring purple line), and used the Metro window-shade interaction model to allow users to slide between map and list view. Also, we improved the destination experience by adding a streetside view of the destination address.
Maps and Directions for Android
I designed the Maps and Directions experience for the first release of the Bing client for Android 2x phones.
Original flavor of Bing for iPhone
I designed the search results and parts of the home screen and images experience for the first release of the iBing client. A lot of people said that they really liked it... 4+ stars in the App Store.
