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Audubon

An Award-Winning Mobile Experience

Mobile App Development

In Need of a Refresh

The National Audubon Society is one of the world’s greatest not-for-profits, with a global mission to conserve our natural and ecological heritage. At its disposal is a wealth of birdwatching resources: photos, sound files, APIs, and field guides.

Birdwatching and mobile apps are a perfect combination. Unfortunately, the Audubon Society’s mobile apps were aging and desperately needed both a technology and design refresh.

Many users tolerated the previous generation of mobile apps because the use case was so compelling.

However, as mobile phones became more ubiquitous and far more powerful, expectations grew. Cameras improved, data became affordable, and hardware capabilities expanded.

The mandate became clear: Develop a modern and beautiful Audubon mobile experience for iOS and Android.

Strategy

Leveraging a Wealth of Data To Empower Users

We set out to create a mobile experience that was part toolbox for the avid birdwatcher, part window into a wealth of birding data and intelligence.

We organized a field guide with over 3,000 photos, eight hours of songbird calls, multi-season range maps, and nearby sighting hotspots. Our app made it easier than ever to identify a new bird, narrowing down a list of possible matches for its location and date spotted in real time.

We also introduced social features to amplify the community aspect of bird identification. We baked Audubon’s mission into the app: Users see the latest news from the world of conservation, and can easily find ways to take action.

What We Did

Project Details

Outcome

An Award-Winning Mobile Experience

The final result is an elegant application for Audubon that presents a wide array of features without overwhelming users.

The field guide contains thousands of photos and audio sounds available at a user’s fingertips. Birders can identify species by providing a handful of descriptive traits with Bird ID. The social component allows users to view nearby sightings from other birdwatchers and get involved in organizational calls-to-action.

It’s a remarkably rich mobile app that is beautiful, reliable, and usable.

Other Work