Design Sprint
EnergySage Community Solar Marketplace
Educating people about community solar
The challenge: The first version of the EnergySage Community Solar Marketplace experience did not offer an impactful consumer education experience. Customers were not sure what they’re signing up for, how the technology worked, or how the different parties (their utility, EnergySage, and the solar farm developers) work together.
Potential customers could not find the information they need to understand the offering and the benefits. Without the knowledge, users would lose the confidence to take action. My job was to build a cross-functional team to create experiences that would provide education about community solar as a technology and the Community Solar Marketplace.
Background
The EnergySage Community Solar Marketplace enables people to subscribe to local solar farms owned by various providers known as developers. Anyone with an electric bill can sign up to receive credits on their bill for discounted clean energy without needing to install any equipment. It’s a great solution for renters, businesses, and homeowners with roofs that aren’t suited to a rooftop solar installation.
I confirmed the hypothesis that the current experience did not provide customers with enough information about the process and value and which generated some distrust and confusion. Users familiar with EnergySage trusted that we had done our due diligence but not enough to move forward and subscribe to a project.
User research revealed that people are generally…
Scanning text - Large blocks of text are not generally effective for communicating key information and are often skipped
Not able to assess key differences in project contract types, understand what "bill credits" are, understand why savings vary by project, or how billing works
Looking for social proof and data. Case studies of people near them and how their electric bill will change once they subscribe
Quick to note that this experience is not educational and assume people land here from a source that provided them with the confidence and information they need to understand the offering
Uncertain about who owns these projects and, once explained, are distrustful of the project developers, especially for projects that show less information than others
Pre-Sprint Research
UX/UI Designer & Design Sprint Facilitator
Educated the leadership team on the value, purpose, and goals of the Design Sprints and served as communication liaison for the Design Sprint team and stakeholders
Conducted research on terminology and key messaging that solar farm project developers use to communicate benefits to potential subscribers
Partnered with representatives from the engineering, marketing, product, and customer support teams to form a well-rounded Design Sprint team
Brought in a panel of experts to be interviewed by the team
Created customer journey diagram to outline current experience and identify target areas and facilitated all brainstorming, ideation, and solutions activities
Helped the team hone in on solutions to prototype using dot votes and broke out sub-teams to tackle the various stages of the prototype in preparation for user testing
Tested the prototype with users and reported findings
My Role
Day 1: Map
Customer journey map
Outline our goals, the customer journey, and key information from experts
We began the Design Sprint by collectively outlined long term goals (6 months, 1 year, 5 years out), failure modes, and dove into the details of the Community Solar Marketplace (CSM) customer journey map.
Experts were interviewed by the team for their experience in this space. We uncovered a lot of detail about the pain points for consumers, the information they should understand about the process, how the savings works, project/developer differences, expectation setting, developer goals, and more.
“How Might We” opportunity categories
Identify themes and vote
I instructed the team to frame challenges into questions to help us sort out areas of opportunity and we took a vote using dot “stickers.”
Emerge with a goal statement
Due to the variety of opportunities available and the challenge of balancing the needs on both sides of the Community Solar Marketplace, we had trouble nailing down a specific goal statement. We reviewed the day’s work and adapted our focus.
Goal Statement
Create an engaging customer experience that enables users to understand the value of community solar and the Marketplace without becoming overwhelmed and feel confident in the process and making a selection
Day 2: Sketch
Overview
Lightning Demo - Features to remix
We began the day with Lightning Demos where each team member spent two minutes demoing features from different websites for us to pull inspiration from.
Target areas - Divide and conquer
We focused on sketching competing solutions. The target areas from the customer journey map were split up amongst the team so everyone had a place to focus.
Sample ‘Crazy 8’s’ image, not from sprint
In the afternoon, the team used the "Crazy 8s" method (8 sketches in 8 minutes) to rapidly iterate on their best ideas. To cap off the day, everyone was given 30 minutes to draw and develop their best solution.
Day 3: Decide
Overview
1 of 3 winning Solutions Sketches
The team reviewed each Solution Sketch and place dots in areas of interest to create a heat map across the seven sketches. The team were given two votes each and our two Decision Makers had three votes. Three designs were chosen to address three target areas. It was a lot to tackle but we were confident we could get such a large prototype built in a day… and we did!
Collective storyboard
Our storyboard served as a blueprint for what we would prototype and test.
Remote Design Sprint operational challenge: The team got into the weeds in detail as a result of storyboarding on a digital whiteboard with endless space for detail instead of a real whiteboard with clunky markers/limited space.
Fortunately, we were able to leverage this detailed work in the Day 4 sessions where we built the prototype.
Day 4: Prototype
View the complete prototype on InVision.
Day 5: User Testing and Outcomes
The Users
2 Novice (no prior knowledge of community solar)
2 (some energy/environmental adjacent knowledge)
2 Advanced (community solar knowledge)
Users were asked what they knew or what came to mind when they heard “Community Solar.” They were then introduced to the prototype, given some detail on the limitations of the prototype and asked to walk through it (with guidance where appropriate).
Results
Success! As of 2021, EnergySage has been working through implementing and iterating the prototype on the live site. Testing revealed that the educational elements in the prototype and changes to the previous experience would build user confidence resulting in more subscriptions. I proceeded to transform the prototype into high fidelity designs, finalize language and assets, and break down the new elements into the backlog for prioritization.
Ongoing testing, iteration, and learning has been key to the success of the Community Solar Marketplace.