A Social Polling App
DecideIt is a polling social media platform that offers a fun, frictionless, and efficient way for individuals, businesses, and trend-setters to gather opinions from like-minded communities. The app allows users to post content in the form of pictures, videos, and other visual elements that can be used to generate feedback from their peers. The results can be seen in real-time, giving users the opportunity to engage in interesting conversations and discover new perspectives.
Play Prototype Demo
The Full Case Study
Role: Design Lead, Point of Contact
Over a three-week sprint, my DecideIt UX team thoroughly researched the digital polling/survey industry, conducted interviews, analyzed our findings, wire-framed and designed in Figma, directed usability tests, presented to stakeholders, and handed-off the prototype to the software engineers.
My team for this project consisted of Holly Shapnick: Project Lead, Ro Procter: Research Lead, Michelle Lee assisted with design, and I was the Design Lead and Point of Contact.
The DecideIt Stakeholders for this project were Prentice Johnson, Kwasi Frye, and Stephanie Bernstein.
Heuristics
● The homepage is overloaded with information
● Dated template, typographic, & color styles hinder new-user appeal
● Users cannot post a poll easily and efficiently
● Lack of customization
● There is a lack of efficiency with incessant sign-in requests
● Icons are ambiguous and misused
● Users are uncertain that they will receive any result
● Users must complete tasks—that invade the privacy of others—in order to post
● Users must invite others when posting and may not merely post publicly or anonymously
Market Research
There’s an abundance of platforms already in existence that are specifically for polling; or social platforms that have customizable polling features. For DecideIt to be viable, it was important to log the key features of the most popular polling sources in order to make a competitive, viable product.
Feature Inventory
● 78% of the applications and sites have customizable polling aesthetics
● 67% have the option to post publicly
● 94% have the option to comment
● 100% offer immediate results
● You must have an account to participate in half of them
● 83% have shareable results
● And 67% have visualized results
● Slack Polly, Polls for Imessage, Slido, and Poll Everywhere are competitors for key features
● Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Reddit are major competitors for feature and monthly active users.
Interviews
From 128 survey responders, we further interviewed eighteen in our target audience of 18-39 years old; beginning with a usability test on the existing DecideIt site, and concluding the session with an interview about internet activity, preferences, and poll participation.
Synthesis
From these results, we were able to conclude that our target audience was between the ages of 18-39. These users had the highest participation in polls, spent the most time on social media applications while online, and preferred mobile.
All users said that they would be interested in a platform that provides community, is easy to use, brings new and fun content, is visual, offers a curated algorithm, and strives to remain current & progressive.
Users are uninterested in a new polling platform that doesn’t pioneer something playful, fresh, and innovative; instead, users will faithfully return to trusted platforms with high-user bases like Google, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Reddit, and Quora to pose their questions.
Problem: Users find the existing DecideIt site overly-complicated. To gather insight, users want a visual, user-friendly platform with an interactive community.
Storytelling
Garrit’s Story
“As a senior University of Michigan, I am about to enter a period of transition. I seek advice from mentors, friends, family, and fellow students on a regular basis; but I would also be interested in the opinions of communities with similar interests because I’m worried that the direct feedback that I receive from those closest to me is biased or uninformed. I’m looking for a new platform where I can ask opinionated questions, engage socially and professionally with new people.”
Solution: A social media native application that allows users to pose questions to a wide community of like-minded people using visually motivating content— where users create a profile, post polls, gather insight, cast votes, discover group conclusions, and build a following.
The Mood
My mood board was inspired by 70s and 90s neon palettes that are resurfacing in the film, fashion, and design industries. The vibrant tones are meant evoke happiness, optimism, and energy. Additionally, I wanted the typography to be nostalgic yet contemporary and accessible.
Logo Redesign
I redesigned the logo using my selected typeface and gradient palette in. DecideIt now gives the impression of a contemporary popular app, and reflects its target user base.
Design Systems
Wireframe
Initially, wireframing was divided into different sections so that every team member could have a chance to explore the component library and practice their design skills. However, this became one of our biggest challenges. Backtracking for consistency slowed the process, so I corrected errors, and assumed control of designing thereafter.
Onboard
● Onboarding demonstrates features and sparks initial curiosity
● New user immediately signs up with phone or email
● Creates a username and password
Connect
● Connect with contacts that already have DecideIt
● Select Circles of interest to curate initial feed
● May bypass steps by skipping for now
● New user lands on their Home Feed
● Apps functionality is easily comprehendible—swipe through photos, like, comment, view other’s comments, share, and most importantly VOTE on active polls.
Customize & Create
● Notification next to the profile
● New user edits their profile by adding a profile picture, and has the option of adding their name, website, pronouns and a bio
● Creates post—the user has the option of selecting between creating a text-based Poll-It, an image-based Photo-It, or a video-based Video-It
● Chooses a Photo-It with a singular image (instead of multiple images).
● Customizes the Photo-It by selecting between a two-answer poll, sliding-scale poll, or multiple-choice poll; and color theme
● User can write a caption, tag Friends, tag Circles, make responses anonymous, turn on or off comments, select the number of days the poll is active
● Preview-It and Share-It
Engage
● Automatically taken to Home Feed and views Photo-It at the top of the feed
● Scrolls, Likes, and Votes
● Notifications magic wand is illuminated
● Accept new Friend Request
● Navigates to Photo-It thumbnail and views results
● Returns to Notifications
● Navigates to a Friend’s Profile Page and Friend’s Profile Feed
● Sees a DecidEd post and recognizes that the cloud check icon symbolizes that a poll is closed
Before & After
By evaluating and addressing the heuristic violations we were presented with at the beginning of this project, we solved the issues that the users identified on the previous DecideIt website. Ultimately, our UX team created an application that will have a higher user-return because it is accessible, customizable, community-based, enjoyable, and informative.
Hand-Off
After presenting or research findings and prototype to the clients, as the Design Lead and Point of Contact I then created a numerical system, annotated the prototype, and organized google drive organized files before handing off the product to our stakeholders and software engineers.