Connected
Connected is a premium dating solution aiming to make personalised pairings made by relationship experts as accessible and easy to use as common dating apps.
role:
Product Designer
User Research
UX strategy
UX & UI Design
Connected is an early stage start-up. The project was part of a Product Design course at Experience Haus London
Step one: Discover
The problem:
Despite an endless pool of dating apps available on the market, people struggle to find meaningful connections.
Business goals:
Provide a premium service that would not only focus on accepting people who are genuine about their quest for love, but alleviate the constant scrolling through the apps by letting relationship experts search the perfect someone for you and carefully listening to your feedback.
All you have to do is say yes.
user research
I sent out screener survey where 25 participants ages 23-30 told me about their dating app usage habits.
I then conducted 4 user interviews to gain better understanding towards their feelings and frustrations when it comes to using dating apps nowadays.
I created an affinity mapping to find the common themes and complied them into key findings.
“I can be picky, even overly fussy, because I know there will be a new profile waiting for me
Participant 4
“It’s a numbers game, if you swipe long enough you increase your chances at finding someone… But even then it’s hard to feel satisfied, what if an even better match is going to show up tomorrow?”
Participant 2
“I tried dating friends of friends… but I feel too much pressure and I feel bad if it doesn’t work out”
Participant 1
Key Findings
The endless swiping on dating apps not only spawns mental fatigue, but promotes choice paralysis
Whether users like it or not, dating apps have become the norm for people looking for connections, making other forms of introduction practically obsolete
When it comes to connections through friends, although some had positive experience, the general consensus was that it was “awkward” (this exact word was used by all participants).
Users have to make quick decisions in order to advance to the next profile. They rely on small bits of information as well as details that aren’t included in their decision-making.
Step two: Define
Based on the findings from the user research, I created to personas so that I can better empathise with them during the process.
Due to time constraints during the project I focussed only on one persona - Samantha.
I created an empathy map for her current situation to be able to identify exact pain points and opportunities.
User stories
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As a person looking for love, I want to find someone who suits me well, so that I can be in a relationship
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As a user, I want to be able to find someone easily without having to put too much work into it
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As a user I want to have as much information about a person I meet online so that I can make a well-informed decision whether I might like them or not
ideation
App
When choosing the best fitting platform for this project, I decided to design an app. The reason being was to position the product within the well-established market of dating apps, which is familiar to younger audiences, and are more likely to download and try out a new app. Furthermore, dating websites are considered outdated and too mature for the targeted age group.
“Swipeless”
User interviews revealed incredibly negative feelings with regards to the amount of engagement dating apps required day-to-day. I wanted to make sure our solution would require less involvement, which goes hand in hand with the business idea of transferring the matchings to the relationship experts.
Alone
Users also noted that being aware of the vast userbase on dating apps causes them to become picky, skip on profiles hastily, become paralysed by the ample choice on the apps and noted that it generally affected them negatively mentally. I decided to focus on a solution that would obscure how many profiles exist, so for all they know - they could be the only person on the app.
Marketplace
I played with the idea of creating a “matchmaker marketplace”, where matchmakers are presented with reviews and success rates, and users choose which one they want to work with, like a relationship mentorship programme. However, every user I interviewed had very negative impressions of matchmakers, so I decided to stir the focus away from them, as well as renaming them “relationship experts”.
Step three: Develop
“As a person looking for love, I want to find someone who suits me well, so that I can be in a relationship”
First I sketched out rough ideas for the entire flow, making sure I include the most important details in each screen.
Once I had sketched for each screen of the user flow, I created mid-fidelity screens in Figma.
I then conducted usability testing with 8 participants, and iterated on the design based on the points of friction the usability testing highlighted.
Change #1
Originally, payment had to be made in order to unlock the match. However, users said that would make them more likely to skip on a match. I decided to push the payment point to later in the process, so that accepting the match is free (it also provides positive feedback to the relationship experts that the match was approved), but unlocking the chat would require payment.
In addition, if one side paid and sent a message, the other side would also have to pay to unlock it.
Change #2
In order to “spice up” the chat feature as well as combat some pain points that were brought up during user research, I incorporated a progress bar feature in the chat. This is to push participants to advance conversation and discourage the ever-present threat of “ghosting” - users will receive prompts to encourage picking up conversations again.
Step Four: Deliver
Complete high fidelity interactive prototype, created in Figma.
How would we measure success?
over 80%
match suggestion acceptance rate
over 50%
user retention during the chat phase
over 75%
of chatting users set up a date
Project
Reflections
This is an early stage start-up
On one hand, it gave me the possibility to shape the experience relatively freely. I could introduce new mechanics and easily move a point of payment from one step of the process to another.
On the other hand, since there isn’t any real users data and behaviours, it’s yet to be seen how users will behave once the application is developed. Once real users begin their journey, many more lessons, findings, and iterations will be necessary.
Saturated market
Despite the app’s unique selling point of personal matchmaking made by relationship experts, the pool of digital dating solution is quite saturated. With this in mind, we have to expect our potential users will probably using other products as well as ours (Jakob’s Law of internet user experience).
Limited testing
As mentioned, I conducted usability testing on the mid-fidelity prototype. However, additional usability testing on the high-fidelity prototype is required, preferably with a bigger pool of participants. Once a beta version of the app is built, and an initial database of users is available, it will allow for broader data to be gathered and synthesised.