Roles
UX Design
User Research
Information Architecture
Visual Design
User Research
Information Architecture
Visual Design
Platforms
Mobile: iOS and Android
Sample Interview
Interview highlights:
– The participant is a woman in her 20's who enjoys spending time with friends. Her favorite places to hang out and catch up with friends are restaurants and coffee shops during lunch breaks.
– The participant commonly experiences complications, back-and-forth, and miscommunication when coordinating meet-ups with friends.
– From our initial brainstorming we identified a "dating app like" experience to be a possible solution to some common problems. The participant is familiar with dating apps and her overall experience using dating apps has been positive.
Defining the Problem
If you are a 20 something with a busy life, making time for friends can be hard. According to those interviewed, back-and-forth conversations, miscommunications, and scheduling conflicts are all leading cause to why keeping up with close friends can be hard.
However, loneliness isn't just a problem for 20 somethings, it can be seen to be a rising issue for ages across the board. According to Survey Center for American Life, the percentage of people claiming they have no close friends jumped from 3% in 1990 to 12% in 2021. The pandemic has certainly contributed to more loneliness as well. In the same article, 13 percent of women and 8 percent of men, ages 30 to 49, claimed they lost touch with most of their friends about a year into the pandemic.
To better frame the problem I have created 3 "How Might We's":
1. How might we help people develop closer friends?
2. How might we help people coordinate with friends?
3. How might we improve the quality of friendship?
Some brainstorming later
The Solution
To combat loneliness, I propose a mobile app solution called Befriend.
Befriend pairs users with paid friends (actors) to become or act like their friends.
Befriend solves 3 major user dilemma's with a few key interfaces and flows:
How might we help people develop closer friends?
As a user, to have a truly close friend, it is important for a friend to understand who I am past and present. The questionnaire that allows users to pick up 3 experiences/attributes that best describes them and gives them a chance to go into detail on the final screen via text, video, and images. The results are displayed on the user's profile. The profile, show all relevant information for both the user and their "new" friends to become closer. A user will later pick a backstory for their friendship but more on that later...
How might we help people coordinate with friends?
As a user, I don't want to spend a lot of time figuring out where and what to do with my friends. The friends/event page is the place for the user to find available friends and places to meet-up by browsing through the card layout or searching. Each friend has a corresponding event and we use a card layout in order to communicate separation between the friends/events to the user. Later a user will see a shared calendar of available dates and pick a backstory for their friendship.
How might we improve the quality of friendship?
As a user, I know I can do a better job at being a better friend, but sometimes my friends are flaky and inconsistent despite how great of a friend I am. In order to guarantee a great friend and an immersive experience, users pay a "set-it-and-forget-it" subscription after they've successfully booked a meet-up with a friend. This helps users ignore the fact that they are paying for a friend... After this, their time with the app can be over, because the friend will contact them via SMS and not the app to increase the immersion.
User Taskflow + Low Fidelity Wireframes
Immersive Experience
In order to maintain immersion, the friend will use the app to chat with the user before the event via SMS. The user also has an opportunity to choose a backstory for their "friendship" to increase the immersion.
High Fidelity Wireframes
