12A - Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 1

Segment:

For this assignment, I chose a segment of college students that attend UF and who need to take the bus (for any reason) in order to get to and from campus.

Interviews: All three of my interviews were with college students who are currently fully enrolled at UF and take the bus on a daily basis from their apartment to campus.

• First, I interviewed Kalyn. Kalyn is a Senior in college and is studying business administration. She lives off campus in an apartment complex down 20^th. She said that she first became aware of the need for a new and improved bus app the very first time she had to take the bus to campus. She was using the current RTS bus app when the app all of a sudden said that the bus had “no prediction,” at that moment she wished there was another app she could download that told her where her bus was. She was now stuck at the bus stop with no bus. She mentioned she texted one of her friends and asked if there is another way to see where her bus was and looked on google and the app store too.
• Second, I interviewed Christian. He is a junior here at UF and is studying aerospace engineering and is extremely invested in his studies. He said that he realized the need when he missed the bus because the app never updated and the bus was closer than he was told. By the time the app updated the bus was already way past his stop, causing him to be late to class. He said he is so angry and frustrated with the app and something needs to change. He then mentioned that he has asked around his friend groups if anyone knows of a better and more reliable app for the buses and everyone told him that there isn’t anything. 
• My third interview was with a freshman in college named Ashley. She is studying Event Management and lives in an apartment complex that’s 10 minutes away from campus. She had a very similar story to Kalyn and Christian. The app wasn’t working for her one morning and was telling her that the bus was “out of service” and she ended up being late to her class. She mentioned that she got extremely frustrated and wished there was some other way to figure out where her bus was. She said she can’t trust the app and always gives herself extra time in the morning to make it to class on time. She then mentioned that she has searched the app store for an updated version of the app, thinking that she had an old version and that’s why it never worked for her. She also asked her friends who used the RTS bus app if they have had problems with the app and what was going on. Since she was just a Freshman she thought she was doing something wrong. 

Conclusion:

I learned that the demand for my service is huge in this segment. College students who take the bus on a regular basis to campus really need a new and improved RTS bus app because they have all experienced problems with the old app. As far as information search goes, there isn’t another app out there. They have all tried and looked for a new app or searched google relating to their problem. Currently there only option is to look for updates to the existing app.