Overview

Horse racing is a very intricate sport and more complex that one would initially think. There are many different types of races, bet types, and ways to handicap (predicting the winner of a race). On any given race, there are a dozen or more factors to consider when picking a winner. For a newbie to horse racing, it can be overwhelming when using an online application to place a bet.

I had a few goals with this feature; increase the overall satisfaction of our customers, increase user retention, increase brand reputation, help long-term growth and revenue, and ensuring competitive advantage

The Problem To Solve

How do I reduce friction for new users? How can I alleviate some of the load that is put onto TwinSpires customer service representatives on high traffic days from new users asking for help with our applications?

The Process

Research & Findings

For months, new player surveys were sent out weekly asking a range of questions to new users. These surveys accounted for thousands of new users over this timeframe, and a large portion of users surveyed have little to no prior experience with betting on horse racing.

In the surveys users continually sent responses that said that they couldn’t understand how to bet on horse racing or that they needed help to better understand horse racing in general. Not that this is necessarily a design flaw of our app specifically, but it is definitely a shortcoming of the horse racing industry. The sport is intricate in many ways, and is intimidating for new users.

User Submitted Responses

These are just a few of the responses that stood out to me:

User Personas

From the data gathered, I wanted to target two specific audiences and create a user persona for each: 

1. The Eager Rookie

The Eager Rookie is a younger user, around 18 to 25 years old that has placed wagers on sports in the past but is interested in learning about horse racing. Great at knowing the ins and outs of parlays and prop bets, pick-5's and exotics are something completely new. Reading past performances, learning trainer-jockey combos, paying attention to changes in class, and even analyzing workouts; this user jumped into the deep end and wants to learn as much as possible about the world of horse racing.

Previous Experience With:

Smartphones, Computers, Social Media Apps, Sports Betting Sites

Goals

The Eager Rookie is looking to learn intricacies of horse racing as well as the TwinSpires app, like a sponge absorb as much knowledge as possible. Finding a betting app that can also teach them about the industry is a big selling point to them.

Frustrations

Despite being a technologically savvy and younger person, the Eager Rookie lacks the first person experience with horse racing. The subtle nuances of this sport only come with familiarity. Credibility is key in this industry, and finding somewhere that has all the information in one spot that is also a reliable source can be difficult.

2. Big Day Casual

The Big Day Casual loves going to the race track on big race days like the Kentucky Derby, enjoying gathering with friends and family to watch the horses run and maybe even enjoy a bourbon. Although the technical aspect does not interest them as much, they enjoy placing some bets and casually learning about horse racing.

Previous Experience With:

Smartphones, In Person Betting Kiosks

Goals

Casual fun is most important to the Big Day Casual, betting for them is only to add some excitement to the day at the track. It is a fun way to engage with horse racing and to connect with friends, family, and other people at the track. Even though betting is purely for fun, the Big Day Casual still wants to make informed decisions and doesn't want to feel like they are just throwing away money. Learning about track conditions, pool sizes, and other things are still important to them. Convenience and usability is important, fumbling around with a clunky app might as well feel like they are reading a dictionary.

Frustrations

Time is a factor to the Big Day Casual, they want to access the information they are looking for in a quick and concise manner so that they can get back to enjoying their day at the track. They want to learn about the best way for them to bet on their smartphone without it being too complicated like other apps can be.

The Strategy

User Flow

Next I worked on defining a user flow that was:
a.) Targeted to all types of users
b.) Easy to get in and out of
c.) Easy for users to go back and reference when needed.
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Ideation

With my initial iterations, I was exploring what the best way of organizing the information in a way that made sense for the user.  

Low Fidelity Wireframes

My thoughts started at segmenting the topics by sections, I also explored displaying a 'Featured topic' grouping to further cater to a user's potential habits.

Prototyping

Finally, I ended up at this sectioned dropdown view. Once a user taps on the dropdown, they can select any of the topics and it will link to that specific slide in a slideshow. This is important so that a user can find the exact topic they would like to reference if they needed to find the information again at a later time. Users can also navigate through an entire section from start to finish, which is beneficial to newer users.

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