The PonyApp

The PonyApp is a horse management application available on iOS, Android and web. It allows users to manage their horses's daily care, medical records and expenses, view aggregated equestrian media and connect with equestrians around the world.

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Lindsay Douglass

Impact

Learn more about PonyApp's global reach.

Tools Used:
Sketch
Illustrator
After Effects
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Reach

Since the launch in 2015, PonyApp has been downloaded 80,000 times, been featured in countless equestrian magazines, blogs and websites and has received adoration from users around the globe.

Kids have done school projects on their favorite PonyApp features, riders have competed globally repping PonyApp gear and enthusiasts have used the app to keep connected to the top sport.

Our Instagram is one of of the most followed accounts in the industry and our growth has been organic. PonyApp truly is a brand with a global reach.

250,000

Horses Created

250,000

Organic Users

250,000

Expenses Added

250,000

Activities Logged

01

"Summed up, the PonyApp is basically a barn manager in your pocket, and possibly my favorite app on the list because it was created by riders, for riders."

02

"The market is devouring what Douglass and Davis are offering. PonyApp is an iPhone app that helps streamline nearly every aspect of the equestrian industry."

03

"PonyApp is simple and user friendly, even for the technologically clumsy."

App Store Reviews

4.7/5
247 Total Reviews
@Janeturmom
OUtstanding app!
So far, I have had this app for a month, and have loved it. I am not one to geek over professional riders, but it is interesting to read now in the “spotlight” section of the app. Although I do not have my own horses, I added the horses I usually ride at my barn (for lessons or my lease) to the “my stable” part of the app. The section is great because there are multiple categories you can fill in, such as notes; which I use a lot primarily for keeping track of what I did on certain lessons, and to hold the “perfect” gait. Along with the professional & modern look, it is very simple and easy to navigate. I recommend this app to any rider that wants to excel in organization, and keep track of their performance.
@olivia_the_rider
The Ponyapp is amazing!
The Pony App is definitely THE best app for allowing equestrians to keep their equine partners on track. Managing vetting, shoeing, and daily workouts/ groom sessions can sometimes overwhelm your calendar, but with this app, all of that is made easy! The business skills behind The Pony App are also phenomenal. Just recently, I won a show coat through The Pony App’s giveaway on social media and the whole process could not have gone any smoother. I had my brand new show coat within 2-3 weeks of winning the giveaway and was even able to do an instagram takeover for The Pony App! 5 out of 5 always for The Pony App!
01

"Summed up, the PonyApp is basically a barn manager in your pocket, and possibly my favorite app on the list because it was created by riders, for riders."

02

"The market is devouring what Douglass and Davis are offering. PonyApp is an iPhone app that helps streamline nearly every aspect of the equestrian industry."

03

"PonyApp is simple and user friendly, even for the technologically clumsy."

PROCESS

RESEARCH

THE Problem

The equestrian industry is underserved and experience many pain points throughout the day that take away valuable time spent in the saddle.

The stakeholders

Equestrian business owners
Equestrian professionals
Horse Owners

The question

How could technology streamline your equestrian business?

REFRAME

What keeps you from spending more time in the saddle? 
What's the worst part of your job? 
Which part of your job do you wish you could focus on more? 
What industries could the equestrian world learn from? 

MIND - MAPPING

I spent a lot of time mind-mapping to identity commonalities between equestrian professions.

USER PROFILES

I conducted interviews with equestrian trainers, veterinarians, barn managers, and horse owners. By recording my interviews I was able to rewatch them and take notes to try to identify common themes.

INSIGHTS + OBSERVATIONS

OBservations

  • Trainers and vets record keep in books at the barn and bring them home.
  • Trainers have a hard time remembering details when it’s crunch time.
  • Professionals are always worried they are absorbing costs from supplies or medications they buy for their businesses.
  • Barn managers would rather forget to bill a client for a specific cost than be called out for charging for something they didn’t do.

INSIGHTS

  • Equestrian business owners are worried they might not appear professional to their clients
  • Professionals don’t want to feel like they need an office to keep track of expenses.
  • Professionals view invoices as equal parts financial statement and equal part management documents.
  • Service providers commonly refer back to past invoices for horse/ client history

PROTYPE

Based on the interviews, I built a number of prototypes that aimed to address the most common themes such as-scheduling, record-keeping, invoicing, staff-management, and new business acquisition. With tools like Invision and Marvel I was able to go back to the individuals I interviewed for demos and feedback.

PROTYPE

I setup interviews with dozens of equestrian professional, horse owners and equestrians around the world about horse management including what was working, what wasn't and where they thought technology could fill in the gaps. Before my conversations I did basic mind mapping exercises to reframe the problem and step back from my personal experiences.

WIREFRAMES

I then did higher-fidelity wireframes of this invoice feature while constantly collecting feedback from my target users at the Stanford Red Barn. As my need-finding interviews continued, it was clear that equestrians were eager for a better way to record and access horse and business data.

OPPORTUNITY

Bring to market a cloud-based equestrian platform for service providers and horse-owners to manage daily horse care and health with features such as expense logging, document uploads, medical history and activity

Since onboarding was a 7 step process, I decided to break up the flow into a few screens. Halfway through users were able to select their horse’s colors and markings in this visually engaging screen that was shared all over social media.

Curved Vector Motion

Text flows through the body and pose and beyond.

Tip: scroll up and down!

Spinning Text Vector

A wheel of text spins as a user scrolls down and reads the page

Feature Highlights

Expenses

Outcome

Users loved the avatar selection process and a #myponyappstable hashtag started trending on Instagram where users would screenshot and repost a photo of their stables

The PONYAPP

Feature Breakdown

The resulting core PonyApp feature allows users to create unique profiles for their horse, a central location they can input important registration data, log expenses incurred, set medical reminders, and upload photos and important documents to the their gallery. Horse owners can invite stakeholders such as veterinarians, trainers and caretakers to contribute data to a horse’s profile, and set restrictions to limit access to certain features.

The PONYAPP

Feature Breakdown

The resulting core PonyApp feature allows users to create unique profiles for their horse, a central location they can input important registration data, log expenses incurred, set medical reminders, and upload photos and important documents to the their gallery. Horse owners can invite stakeholders such as veterinarians, trainers and caretakers to contribute data to a horse’s profile, and set restrictions to limit access to certain features.

The PONYAPP

Feature Breakdown

The resulting core PonyApp feature allows users to create unique profiles for their horse, a central location they can input important registration data, log expenses incurred, set medical reminders, and upload photos and important documents to the their gallery. Horse owners can invite stakeholders such as veterinarians, trainers and caretakers to contribute data to a horse’s profile, and set restrictions to limit access to certain features.

Articles

While we did create some original content, articles were sourced from 3rd party media outlets. We buit a CMS to upload the articles title, image, date and description. 3rd party articles opened in a web browser within th app, oringial content opened to an expanded spotlight view.

Videos

Videos could be uploaded to our API, they autoplayed in a small vertical view and clicking the expand button would open a full screen horizontal player with video controls

Swipe for more

Results

Results could be expanded to a full screen view (pictured) where users could see athlete names, nationality and competition results.

Avatar Design

This is one of the designs I'm most proud of. Since the on-boarding flow asked for a lot from users, the avatar selection screen was a great way to break it up and engage users with a fun and interactive step (that was shared all over social media for more than a year!)

Swipe for more

My Stable

Where a user can view a summary of all their horses and the features available for each horse including:

  • Horse Access
  • Activities
  • Expenses
  • Reminders
  • Notes

Expenses

Tracking expenses was a consistent request during our need-finding interviews. The expense feature allows users to log expenses or profits by horse. Filter and search capabilities allow users to view results in categories such as time, contributing party and expense type.

Swipe for more

Horse Access / Privileges

Account owners can invite other parties such a grooms, veterinarians, and trainers. Limited access members are allowed to see everything except for a horse's expenses.

Horse Selection Screen

Here users can select which horse or horses they wish to record activities or reminders for.

Activity Selection

It was important to find a happy medium between restricting the possible activities to log and providing an empty text box. I created a split screen of ten main categories in alphabetical order, with “subcategories” that would appear after a category had been selected with an option for an “other” field. The repopulated text signaled to users how they should be using the feature while still allowing flexibility for custom inputs. We constantly reviewed, the “other” inputs to include commonly logged activities into the pre-populated database.

Activity List

Here users can browse and search for their complete and incomplete activities. Clicking an activity expands the user to the activity breakdown where they many have recorded notes or attached photos.

Articles

While we did create some original content, articles were sourced from 3rd party media outlets. We buit a CMS to upload the articles title, image, date and description. 3rd party articles opened in a web browser within th app, oringial content opened to an expanded spotlight view.

Videos

Videos could be uploaded to our API, they autoplayed in a small vertical view and clicking the expand button would open a full screen horizontal player with video controls

Swipe for more

Results

Results could be expanded to a full screen view (pictured) where users could see athlete names, nationality and competition results.

Avatar Design

This is one of the designs I'm most proud of. Since the on-boarding flow asked for a lot from users, the avatar selection screen was a great way to break it up and engage users with a fun and interactive step (that was shared all over social media for more than a year!)

Swipe for more

My Stable

Where a user can view a summary of all their horses and the features available for each horse including:

  • Horse Access
  • Activities
  • Expenses
  • Reminders
  • Notes

Expenses

Tracking expenses was a consistent request during our need-finding interviews. The expense feature allows users to log expenses or profits by horse. Filter and search capabilities allow users to view results in categories such as time, contributing party and expense type.

Swipe for more

Horse Access / Privileges

Account owners can invite other parties such a grooms, veterinarians, and trainers. Limited access members are allowed to see everything except for a horse's expenses.

Horse Selection Screen

Here users can select which horse or horses they wish to record activities or reminders for.

Activity Selection

It was important to find a happy medium between restricting the possible activities to log and providing an empty text box. I created a split screen of ten main categories in alphabetical order, with “subcategories” that would appear after a category had been selected with an option for an “other” field. The repopulated text signaled to users how they should be using the feature while still allowing flexibility for custom inputs. We constantly reviewed, the “other” inputs to include commonly logged activities into the pre-populated database.

Activity List

Here users can browse and search for their complete and incomplete activities. Clicking an activity expands the user to the activity breakdown where they many have recorded notes or attached photos.

Key Product Features

Spotlight Newsfeed

While PonyApp is primarily a management application, equestrian content drove engagement and made strategic partnerships possible. Our aggregated "Spotlight" newsfeed showcased articles, videos sourced from third-party content providers.
Expanded Results
Third-Party Articles
Video Content

Horse Profiles

A central location for users to input registration data, log expenses, set medical reminders, and upload photos and important documents to the their gallery.

Horse owners can invite stakeholders such as veterinarians, trainers and caretakers to contribute data to a horse’s profile, and set restrictions to limit access to certain features.

Horse Profile
Expenses
Avatar Selection

Activity Logging

A place for horse owners to record their horse's daily activities. Push notifications alerted stakeholders when key activities had been logged allowing for better communication and a rolling record of a horse's medical and fitness history.
Horse Select
Category Select
Subcategory Select

Ponyapp praise

The PonyApp Community

Some snapshots of PonyApp's global reach!

Learn More

Learn more about the app's reach, community and my design process my following the links below.