ROLE
UI/UX Designer

DURATION
3 weeks

TOOLS
Figma
Miro

TEAM
Jameka Josephs
Zenia Kim
Tomomi Tsukioka

Interact with prototype →

TYPES OF EVENTS

There are three types of events the users can experience: hosted, hostless, and livestream. 

In a hosted event, rooms are guided by a host and there is a limit to the amount of participants. 

In a hostless event, an unlimited number of participants are led into smaller breakout rooms for a conversational experience. The group votes together on how to move on from one section to the next. 

In a livestream event, an unlimited amount of participants watch a livestream then are taken into smaller breakout rooms. The phase of watching a livestream to a breakout room may loop a few times.

STAKEHOLDER INTERVIEW

Before conducting any research, we interviewed our stakeholder, the founder of Junto, to gain a better understanding of objectives for his platform. After talking with him, we were able to establish these goals and visions for our project.

For our goals, we were determined to design a way to increase user engagement while further valuing and understanding the users’ feedback.

As our vision, we strived to keep true to Junto’s brand while promoting an inclusive, positive sense of community and environment for the users.

GOALS

• Incorporate waiting room

• Add post-conversation CTA

• Engage users

• Gain user feedback

• Measure success

VISION

• Demonstrate seamless flow

• Maintain Junto’s brand

• Establish sense of community

• Promote inclusivity

• Encourage positive reinforcement

With our stakeholder interview, we agreed on three aspects to improve:

1. Incorporating a waiting room before users are placed into conversation rooms

2. Adding some shape of post-conversation call-to-action to encourage users to continue the dialogue

3. Possible color scheme change
   

TASK ANALYSIS

We next conducted a competitive analysis in order to understand competitive applications that offer similar discussion spaces like Junto.

Task: Create Account

Discord

1. Click on “Register”

2. Enter phone or email

3. Enter email

4. Register by username and password

5. Enter date of birth

6. Create account

Facebook Groups

1. Click on “Create New Group”

2. Name group

3. Choose type of privacy

4. If private, choose type of visibility

5. Invite friends by typing name or selecting from suggestions

6. View desktop preview

7. View mobile preview

8. Press “Create”

Geneva

1. Click on “+” button on side navigation

2. Select “Create Your Own Home”

3. Customize rooms in your home

4. Name home

5. Add a home description

6. Choose a home color

7. Choose a home privacy setting

8. Done

Task: Join/Create

Discord

1. Create your own server or start from template

2. Choose “For My Friends” or “For Community”

3. Discover “Featured Communities”

Facebook Groups

1. Select “Join Group”

2. Answer questions

3. Submit answers

4. Cancel request if wanted or await approval

Geneva

1. Click on “+” button on side navigation

2. Select “Create Your Own Home”

3. Tap on “Already Have An Invite?”

4. Invite link from clipboard will be automatically copied to join

ELEMENT ANALYSIS

We conducted an element analysis to compare applications to look at waiting room and reviews system ideas.

Zoom has an initial room for the user to wait in before entering the conversation. 

This provides a way for the user to utilize the waiting time by getting ready before joining the room. 

The host would also have the opportunity to prepare before the participant joins while providing a smooth and seamless transition.

With Uber, we noticed that the user is presented with the option of rating their driver with a star ranking or giving a compliment with an icon of choice. 

They may also leave a personalized thank you note or give feedback on how their experience could be improved. These options allow the users to feel heard and give input on future improvements to be made. 

By providing the compliments feature, the app promotes positive reinforcement by motivating the drivers to maintain or improve their work performance.

CONTENT AUDIT

Before moving onto the define phase, we decided to thoroughly navigate and experience the current existing state of Junto. We were able to better understand and relate to the users as a result. 

In the waiting room, we learned that there were no activities the user can interact with while waiting. We felt that there was a lack of providing an engaging and entertaining way to excite the user before joining the conversation.

After the conversation has ended, we were met with optional post-convo screens. 

When providing feedback, we felt that only providing a star rating system would inhibit Junto from further understanding the users’ thoughts and feelings in depth. 

It would be difficult to gain detailed feedback regarding issues or potential ways to enhance their experience.

USER INTERVIEW

We conducted user interviews with 9 participants. From these interviews, we wanted to understand on how users:

• stay informed on current events/news

• talk and share opinions on online platforms

• decide which platform to use to share their thoughts and opinions

• learn more about the causes they care about

We created “I” statements from questions including the above.

JUNTO USER INTERVIEWS

We also conducted user interviews with actual Junto users. We needed to understand pain points and likes. We also created “I” statements from these interviews.

PRIMARY PERSONA: RIVER

As a result of our research, we created our primary persona. River is someone who already enjoys and actively participates in open discussions. He loves connecting with new people and is currently looking for a platform where he can have close peer interactions. He appreciates being able to learn from and connect with new people and seeks to find a platform that provides intimate peer interactions.

• Wants

  • A space to share their thoughts and opinions

  • A place to meet like-minded users

• Needs

  • A space to safely share their opinions

  • A place to talk about several different topics

• Pain Points

  • Haven’t found a space to have small, intimate conversations

  • Unable to find a way to have discussions about one specific topic of interest with others

SECONDARY PERSONA: JAISHA

Jaisha has been an active user of Junto who joins conversations at least once a week. She enjoys having discussions about topics she’s interested in and stays updated on current events/news.

• Wants

  • Participate in an inclusive environment

  • Develop personal relationships with users 

• Needs

  • Provide feedback on conversation

  • Leave feedback on other participants

  • Offer improvements to be made

• Pain Points

  • Has trouble feeling included in conversations

  • Feels like some conversations become too subjective

JOURNEY MAPPING

We also created a journey mapping for River to visualize the process that he would go through when it comes to group conversations.

USER FLOW

We then created a user flow that will illustrate the basic of flow of one user.

SKETCHES

Design studio and final sketches created as a team.

COLOR REVISION

We also discovered through research that users thought Junto's existing color palette could be more colorful, so we changed it to make the platform feel more dynamic and pleasant.

We kept blue to evoke feelings of trust, self expression and wisdom in our user. We decided to add orange into the color palette because it represents feelings of sociability, friendliness and confidence. 

USABILITY TESTING

We conducted usability testing on 6 participants with 4 goals and 14 tasks. We noted the time it took each participant to finish and how many errors, if applicable, they faced.

96% of the users successfully navigated through the prototype.

Goals:

1. User can successfully navigate through the entire process under 7 minutes

2. User can identify the purpose of the waiting room with no more than 1 error

3. User can provide feedback on conversations and participants under 3 minutes 

4. And lastly, User can complete the donation process with no more than 2 errors

Tasks:

1. Understand the purpose of waiting room

2. Understand the content or function of each activity in waiting room

3. Understand the function of countdown timer

4. Navigate through ‘Did you know?’ activity successfully

5. Read and digest ‘Did you know?’ content

6. Did not find the amount of text overwhelming

7. Rate the conversation

8. Gave feedback on potential improvements

9. Rated a partipant

10. Understood purpose of Donation modal

11. Understood the purpose of icons on Donation modal

12. Successfully completed donation payment

13. Exited the conversation room

14. Did not skip any information throughout whole experience

ITERATIONS

From our usability testing, we were able to make iterations for our final prototype. On the left is our initial prototype and the right is our iterations.

With our prototype we tested, and we did not have the timer visible in each activity room during the waiting room.  In our iteration on the right, we added the timer so users know the remaining time before the conversation starts. 

For the participant feedback slide, we gathered insight from users that they felt like the star rating was not contributing to the positive environment Junto promotes.  We removed the star rating and kept the participant feedback to positive badges user can assign.  

We also added a “submit” button in order to successfully show the user that they have saved their feedback submission.

On our donation details slide, some users felt unsafe and unsure if they would want to donate to an organization without knowing more about them. In our iteration process, we added the organization logo and a short description of the organization.

Lastly, we had comments that the lack of knowing how many more screens users have to go through to finish the end-of-conversation process was troublesome. 

We added a progress tracker to let users know where they are in the process.

PROTOTYPE

Our prototype created in Figma.
Interact with prototype →

1. I enjoyed working with my teammates with a real world client. I have learned how to work with key stakeholders and to understand the business needs while keeping the users in mind.

2. Moving forward, I would want to do another round of user interviews to gain insight on what really motivates users to continueI dialogues after conversations.

3. I would also want to do a deeper usability testing on the user interface.