“Dogtown Media brought our TV show to life with an app that informs and inspires college students across the nation.”

Nathan Gebhard

Co-founder of Roadtrip Nation

The Challenge

Roadtrip Nation is a PBS TV series that encourages and empowers individuals to find out who they are and what they want to do with their working lives. The TV show features everyone from CEOs of well-known companies (Cartoon Network, Google, etc.) to fishermen, letting the viewer explore the working lives of varying occupations.

We were asked to create a mobile version of the TV show, the Roadtrip Nation Mobile App, while maintaining the organization’s branding: fun, dynamic, and engaging while still connecting professionals with individuals starting in the job market.

The Process

Roadtrip Nation’s website was incredibly dynamic. The challenge was in building a Roadtrip Nation app that was just as engaging without being too complicated, and still keep the relevant information of the working professionals offering novices advice. Our guiding principle during the mobile app development stage was to take the fun of the TV show and put it into a user-friendly mobile application

The Solution

We went ahead and created animation for the app, aiming for it to not be distracting but engage the user in the process of receiving advice from working professionals. For instance, we developed loading animation that would pop up while the user waited for their matches to these professionals, adding personality to the app.

We developed the app so that it is an interactive storytelling experience, so that the user is able to access videos and background from professionals working in their field of interest. This created the dynamism Roadtrip Nation tasked us with for the app.

The Result

We developed a mobile app that is fun to use. The design team at Roadtrip Nation commended us for our work, and were impressed by the results. We figured out a way to organize the large amount of information in the app that makes it engaging and dynamic for the user, with each button in the app expanding to more information about the matched working professional and their video advice and commentary easily accessible for the user. We were commended for doing this in such a way that the app didn’t overwhelm the user, but that was instead interesting and captivating.

Device Optimization

We also created an iPad version of the app in landscape and portrait mode.