PERFECTING HOW FARMERS EARN
In May 2020, I got a call from the CEO of Indotani to build a community app for farmers with the aim that they thrive. A very short brief because he mainly had the ideas in his head & it would be interpreted to sketches and designs by me after every meeting.
I am the product designer / product owner to this ambitious project to bring this Indotani Farmers Experience V1 for the Indonesian market.
DESIGN BY ACCRETION
In 3 months, Indotani transformed from just an idea into designs. I was constantly reminded that the product itself was “the farmer” and the app was merely a tool to aid better yeild. My responsibility was to translate what was was needed to make them thrive in real life to the palm of every farmers hand.
Indotani app POC (Proof of concept) was designed to 85% in July but struggled to scale along the hypergrowth of the company. Fundamental Usability was challenged. Disparate features and experiments competed for focus. App reliabilty and performance increased exponentially.
The evolution of the Indotani Farmer’s from inception to now
THE CHALLENGE
RECAPTURE THE VISION IN 2 MONTHS
Our goal for the project was to recapture the magic of the early days of Indotani. The original premise was simple: replicate the process on the field without it being complicated for an “illiterate farmer”.
However, we weren't trying to revert to a simple past. Our ambitions were to create a strong foundation that embraced a rapidly evolving business and more diverse user base.
Our high level goals were to:
- Make it easy to use for every farmer no matter the country
- Give farmers access to money and inputs to farm better
- Create a platform for innovation and deeper engagement.
MY ROLE
I led the design of the Indotani app between May 2022 and August 2022 and was the only designer on the community, insights, Agronomy, Sales and Profile features.
In addition, I worked along side with a process/field engineer, a content/product strategist & a graphic designer. Working on this project made me wear so many hats : A researcher, Ux writer, designer (Visual, Product).
(I paused working on the project to allow the POC be tested by actual indonesian farmers in August and I picked up the marketing website design to give the company credibility.)
KICKOFF
PICKING UP THE PIECES
At the outset of the project, we didnt really have a clear mission or specific goal for the farmer's experience. Without having pre-existing insights, I patnered with our process/field engineer who lives in Indonesia to explore how the farmers were doing business regularly.
EARLY INSIGHTS FROM THE FIELD
We tested the early Indotani App with some farmers on the field. Our goals were to understand the challenges farmers faced on the day to day running of their farm.
COMMUNICATION ISSUES
A lot of farmers communicated with a chat app usually created by a senior farmer but they complained that would like to know challenges faced by farmers in other provinces of Indonesia. It was either that or physical chats with their farm leaders.
LINK UP TO INPUT SHOPS
They wanted to be able to reach out to input shops around and if possible get them on credit and also get them delivered. The current process is stressful; forms have to be filled for credit, people have to go the shops physically and no way to know if there’s a location nearby.
STRESSFUL LOAN PROCESS
Farmers were frustrated with how long it took to secure a loan and the multiple processes. They also voiced on the amount of documents they had to get and how unsure at the end if they would get the loan.
SELLING THEIR PRODUCE
Farmers were vocal about the many problems they faced when they tried to sell their produce after harvest with irregular prices & how they never had the final say.
SERVICE REQUEST
Request for services like renting of trucks, renting harvest equipments and also moving of heavy things from one place to the other is one of the hardest task they face daily.
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