Problem: The Weather Company sought to attract a new audiences and to differentiate against the competition, and against the ubiquity of weather information. The goal was to evolve the paradigm of weather data points into an engaging weather story by highlighting the intersection between personal well-being and weather.
Solution: I executed original research seeking correlations between well-being interest and weather impact. The resulting research identified well-being as areas of focus, and gave the product and design teams specific examples of how people describe weather’s impacts their well-being. Further research identified material for research-grounded user scenarios, e.g. What to do about it when weather is an obstacle to outdoor activity.
Results: As part of a phased rollout, The Weather Company issued a major update in Spring of 2024 with well-being focused features and content, well-received by their audience.
Research Methodology
Over 5000 iOS and Android active weather app users were surveyed remotely over a period of two weeks.
Participants answered a variety of questions aimed at identifying a) which aspects of well-being individuals were most interested in, and what’s been affecting them the most, b) attitudes around managing their well-being including sense of agency, and tools for managing, and c) how various weather conditions can affect their well-being, and how they respond or compensate.
Analysis & Findings
Results were weighted by age and by platform. Results achieved a confidence level of 95% with a 2% margin of error. I used qualitative and quantitative methods were used for data analysis including t-tests; open-ended responses were coded and categorized then presented as means.
The final report identified key findings and next steps, giving product and marketing teams clear direction for where to develop well-being-forward content and features. I executed follow-up research to identify clear triggers for behavioral responses to varying weather conditions relative to maintaining and improving well-being.
Summary available for presentation upon request.