Client's brief
Create a digital platform for 30-50 years olds to meet (platonic) and form new friendships.
Define the problem
In order to tackle the problem directly, we decided to narrow down our target group, 30~50 years old professionals, which share a large amount among the whole demographic.
Based on the brief, we listed several factors of difficulties that may hinder 30-50 year olds making new friends.
Lack of time (outer subjective)
Trust crisis (inner subjective)
Lack of common topic (outer subjective)
Hard to maintain a friendship (mixed)
Solution
(Detailed approach is right behind the section)
Goal
The main goal of the product is to Get Easier Connection: Help the end user connect with each other easily from online to offline.
In order to reach the top goal, I facilitated the team to brainstorm and break it down to several executable criterias:
1. Build Credibility: help users building trust quickly through using the product itself.
2. Gain Motivation: Let them be more interested about each other.
3. Increase Retention: facilitate users to use the product and connect with other people more frequently
Research About users
Data shows there is 33 percentage of time on average that professionals would spend their time at work. During the field research, we interviewed 15 people who are all working professionals and these are some thought when talking about how to meet new people:
After the research, we saw an opportunity to promote friendships within the workplace.
Our proposal
Circle — An enterprise app for medium organisations to facilitate interactions between colleagues who don’t typically work together, over meals.
Reframe the challenges
How can we connect with each other and have lunch? (connection)
1. What to eat and who will I eat with? (motivation)
2. How do I know you are my real colleague(s)? (liability)
3. How can we meet again?(retention)
User case
Persona
User Journey
How we solve the problem
We tried to answer the questions and come up with solutions:
What to eat and who will I eat with? (motivation)
User can choose to eat within a group that has already build or create their own groups. Also, user has the ability to choose the group size, date and where to eat. All groups are anonymous at first until user join the group.
The anonymous system may trigger user’s curiosity: who will join the group? And quickly helps user get on board.
How do I know you are my real colleague(s)? (liability)
During the on-boarding process, user requires to login with their company E-mail and password which retrieved from authorized company database. Once user joined a group, she/he can see the other group member’s position, phone number to make sure it’s a transparent and liable group.
How can we meet again?(retention)
Circle has two solutions in order to boost user retention. First, once user finish the group lunch, there is an “add as lunch buddy” button. Anytime when the friend that user just added creates a new group, the user will have a chance to receive invitation notification to join the group.
Other than that, company HR has the ability to create free lunch for specific event or for team building. This will not only increase the user retention, but also help the company raise the employee satisfaction.
Rapid prototyping
During the prototyping process, I facilitate the team to use the bull’s eye to prioritize the features and then came up with the site map so as to run our first prototype.
Evaluation and Iteration
- User testing
With solid design goals in mind, I helped the team set up the place for user test. Here is an overview for the process:
Give the user a brief introduction about the product
Put user into the scenario and let user to think loud
Ask user to finish several tasks
Gather feedback and finish screen recording
Fill up questionnaire and give participation gift
- Measure success
In order to reach the design goals, we quantified the goals into several evaluation questions for user testing which include: the motivation, comfort, difficulty and confidence level while using circle.
Results
We tested the prototype over 25 people who worked in mid~large enterprises. And the result is quite positive. The chart listed below is an overview of the evaluation of how users rate their motivation, comfortability connect with co-workers, manage difficulty toward lunch groups and confidence level while using the app Circle.
Design iteration
1. Group member page
During the user test, we found user has a high chance to get lost in the group member page. We interviewed those users who think the other users may lack of credibility, some of the interviewees feel Group member page should have more information about other co-workers.
Other than that, user got confusing when they saw the “+” button. Later on, we tested several signifier buttons to see which one is more user friendly with meaning of add as friend and then we change to the most convincing one.
Besides, there is a user who was thinking loud and found it is difficult to bring an extra friend to the group as the user didn’t see the check button in the join room page. We added bring one more co-worker function in the member page to make sure user can add friend into the group in any stages.
2. Create group page
In the create group page, previously, we only have on page which is choose the cuisine and place. During the user test, we found as a joined member, they have a high chance to know about how many people are in the group and when is the event. As there is so much information that user want prior to join the group, we developed an user friendly progress tracker to help them know the group better before join in.
Future Consideration
In addition to developing the application with a functional backend and server, we will be adding the following features.
