1. Note:
Assignment Question: Design an Appointment Scheduling App for Small
Business Owners (doctors, dentist, therapists)
Nov 25, 2021
ScheduleEasy: A quick and
simple way to schedule
appointments
2. Goal & Vision
• Goal: Our goal is to design an appointment scheduling app
that enables small business owners (dentists, doctors,
therapists) to create/publish an appointment calendar as
per availability and manage incoming appointment
requests. Customers can also book appointments as per
available slots.
• Vision: We believe that we can design an appointment
scheduling app that is fast and easy to use. With machine
learning models and a simple clicking process, we believe
we can build a scheduling app that requires little to no
hassle. This vision will enable us to create a strong app for
the future!
3. User Persona #1: Small Business Owner
Characteristics Description
About Active small business owner specialized as a
doctor, dentist or therapist.
Typically between 30-55 years old.
Keen on time efficiency and have little
tolerance for error.
Pain Points 1) Frustrated about time spent in maintaining
the logistical process of scheduling
appointments.
2) High chance of overbooking or
mismanaging appointments.
Goals 1) To spend the least amount of time on
scheduling and minimize the need for
monitoring or updating details to schedule.
2) To create a seamless system with a well
defined flow that also has the advantage of
machine learning to prevent overbooking or
other possibilities of appointment
mismanagement.
4. User Persona #2: Customer
Characteristics Description
About An individual seeking to schedule an
appointment with a medical professional.
An adult above the age of 18.
Not very technically savvy and in need of an
appointment.
Pain Points 1) Frustrated at cancellations or
postponements of appointments due to errors
in scheduling.
2) Find it difficult to use complex apps with a
feature overload.
Goals 1) To match the appointment requester’s
urgency and also the medical professionals
availability with accuracy.
2) To create a simple click system that would
not require wordy manuals to understand and
can be used on the go.
5. Takeaways
• The major pain points for both the small business owner and the
customer are focused around creating a simple to use system with
minimal steps, providing a match with high accuracy between the two
stakeholders and developing a self learning tool which can provide
suggestions.
• We should focus on simplifying the requesting and accepting part of
the scheduling process in our app. Any edge cases like special requests
can be taken on call or offline.
• We will also be focusing on city areas in India, an Android app and only
medical professionals who would contain the bulk of appointment
requests to start off with.
• Our objectives are to:
1) Reduce steps to schedule appointments.
2) Provide a seamless process for business owners to update
schedules.
3) Create a reliable matching algorithm for both the stakeholders.
4) Provide invaluable suggestions to both stakeholders.
6. Assumptions
• The customer knows what type of medical assistance they
need and are aware of the small business owner.
• The stakeholders and customers will be approving the
appointments.
• Any additional or special requests out of scope for this app
will be dealt with offline or on call.
• Any no shows will be handled between both stakeholders
with escalation to app being last resort.
7. Architecture: Small Business Owner 1/2
• Step 1: Initialization
1) Default: User will be provided an option to create a calendar.
2) Calendar Addition: User can also update or link an existing
calendar to the app.
• Step 2: Modifying Slots
1) Blocking Slots: User can block few slots by choosing the time and
date and frequency. User could also list a reason.
2) Rearranging Slots: User can request for modification of approved
appointments at least 3 days prior to the appointment day. A
notification will be sent to customer about the change.
• Step 3: Approving Appointment Requests
1) Approval: User can approve appointment requests.
2) Modifications: User can request back to appointment requests
suggesting a change of time or day.
3) Suggestions: App will generate suggested time slots based on
needs of the customer and historical patterns
8. Architecture: Customer 2/2
• Step 1: Initialization
1) Default: User will input basic details to match with a small business
owner.
2) Calendar View: User will be able to view the calendar of the selected
small business owner.
• Step 2: Picking a Slot
1) Selecting Slot: User can click on a box in the time and day within the
calendar and use dropdowns to choose between type of appointment.
2) Unavailable Slots: Depending on urgency, a special request can be sent
to small business owner and suggestions will be made by the app for
viable alternates.
• Step 3: Requesting an Appointment
1) Sending Requests: User will send a request to the relevant small
business owner.
2) Status: User will be able to see status of their request after login or
through email/phone updates.
11. Roadmap
Feature Priority Technical
Complexity
User Impact
Search mechanism for customers to match with small
business owners.
1 6 9
Link to existing platforms (Calendly) or direct import
option to display calendar.
1 3 9
Automatic update of approved/modified appointments
to calendar.
1 4 8
Push notifications or mobile updates to update relevant
stakeholder of changes or send reminders.
2 4 7
Adding machine learning models to observe historical
patterns and take inputs based on users needs to provide
recommendations.
2 9 7
Design UI such that it is simple to use and requires simple
clicks.
2 3 8
Availability in multiple languages (top 10 commonly
spoken languages of India to start with)
3 4 4
Ability to edit calendars online for small business owners. 1 3 9
12. Measuring Success 1/2
• Goal: Our product goal is to provide a seamless way to
connect customers to small business owners and schedule
appointments seamlessly and quickly.
• Actions:
Customer:
1) Searching for small business owner.
2) Requesting an appointment
3) Checking status
Small Business Owner:
1) Updating/modifying calendars
2) Confirming appointments
13. Measuring Success 2/2
• Metrics:
Customer:
1) User Funnel (when do users drop off the funnel; retention rates)
2) Number of appointments per user
3) % approved appointments
Small Business Owner:
1) # of modifications to calendar per user
2) # of approved appointments per user
3) Time spent updating/editing the calendar
• Evaluation: There are some potential pitfalls with these metrics.
Sometimes, the number of appointments per user can be misleading
as it entirely depends on when people require medical help. Also %
approved appointments doesn’t necessarily translate into the quality
and showing up on the day of the appointment. Similarly for small
business owner, if the metric # modification to calendar per user is
less, that doesn’t always mean the app is doing a good job of keeping
the calendar updated; maybe that user doesn’t have many requests
overall. All these considerations need to be accounted for with
additional qualitative data and follow to improve our product
14. Competitors & Marketing
• Competitive Advantage:
1) This app is focused mainly on booking appointments and
not managing teams or enterprises unlike Calendly so we
can provide a curated experience.
2) We also will provide a recommendation engine that isn’t
available on some available products like Calendly,
Appointlet, etc.
• Marketing: We should start out by onboarding medical
professionals in city areas to start off with. They, in turn
can start suggesting their clients to use the app to book
further appointments. Post the success of the initial
acquisition, we can brainstorm some broad digital
marketing ideas and movement into multiple types of
professionals; not just medical.
