MentorBuddies
MentorBuddies is a mobile app where members can find a design expert to chat with privately for about 15 minutes, in exchange for a small donation to the charity that mentor has chosen.
Client:
Design Buddies
Scope:
Affinity map
User flow
Wireframe
Hi-fi Mockup
My role:
UX Designer
Duration:
1 week
February, 2023
WHAT IS THE CONTEXT?
Design Buddies is an exclusive community of over 30,000 designers from around the world, hosted on Discord. Design Buddies is a great place to get quick advice and feedback from other designers and peers via chat. But, there is a growing demand for members to find expert mentors “on demand” to get more specific and detailed answers to their questions. So, Design Buddies created Mentor Buddies where members can find a design expert to chat with privately, in exchange for a small donation to the charity that mentor has chosen. After a privately released beta test, Mentor Buddies team wants to make some improvements to the app.
THE PROBLEM
High drop-off in the onboarding process -most new users never make it to their first session.
MY ROLE
My role was to analyze why users don’t make it through the onboarding process and to the first session, synthesized feedback from usability tests and decided where to focus. Then I re-designed a high fidelity mock-up to improve the user’s experience.
KEY FINDINGS FROM STAKEHOLDER INTERVIEW
A stakeholder interview with Grace Ling, Founder of Design Buddies helped identifying the key goals and challenges for the project.
KEY POINT OF FRICTION
Heat maps suggest some friction in the onboarding process.
AFFINITY MAP
Affinity map helped synthesizing feedback and visualizing main pain points.
Feedback #1
“I am not really sure what I’m signing up for and what to expect.”
Feedback #2
“I don’t know where to begin, there’s an overwhelming amount of mentors. I’m going to scroll until I find what I’m looking for.”
Feedback #3
“I am having trouble getting to know the mentor, and past experiences.“
OPPORTUNITY
How might we questions helped reframing insights into opportunity and focusing on solving problems.
HMW #1 - Profile Building
How might we clearly show users the value they’ll receive before signing up?
How might we present users with a signup when they’re highly motivated?
HMW #2 - Mentor List Page
How might we give users the tools and information they need to “scan” mentors based on criteria they care about, and select one confidently?
HMW #3 - Mentor Profile Page
How might we present mentors in a way that allows users to confidently decide if they are “the one” they want to talk to?
USER FLOW
Sign up page was originally in onboarding process, but there was a high drop-off during the process. Users were not motivated to sign up because they they didn’t know what to expect and didn’t feel confident if they would find the right mentor. So, I decided to move it after users decide to make donation and start chat.
WIREFRAME SKETCH
A stakeholder interview with Grace Ling, Founder of Design Buddies helped identifying the key goals and challenges for the project.
1. Profile Building
• Added screens in onboarding to introduce briefly what MentorBuddies about and what users can get from it.
• Added more criteria to know users specific interest and level. Users will feel confident that MentorBuddies will match them with mentors in their interest area.
• Added 2~3 mentor matches so users know what mentors they can expect, not overwhelmed by a long list of mentors at first.
2. Mentor List
• Divided the section into two: ‘top mentor’ and ‘more mentors matches your interest’ to help users not getting overwhelmed by a long list of mentors.
• Added filter function next to the search bar to help users easily find mentors in their specific interest area.
• Added filter buttons for the popular interest for quick navigation.
• Added a favorite function (star icon) so users can review mentors they are considering in one place.
• Each mentor profile card shows more information that users would want to know during quick review.
3. Mentor Profile
• Added more information that users would want to know and help them confidently decide to chat with a mentor.
• Added parts: years of experience, ratings and reviews, available schedule, expertise, explanation on what users can get during the session, Linkedin profile/Portfolio, and interest outside of job.
NEXT STEPS
The next step would be the user testing the solution to see if it is effective in helping users start their first session and measure the overall conversion rate.
The following step would be to continue refining the solution and improving conversion rate.