An app that facilitates individuals to form meaningful connections without any expectations of dating
Company
Candid
Timeline
6 Months
Context
Candid is an online dating app that focuses on providing users with a profoundly personal and intuitively tailored dating experience. We achieve this by facilitating meaningful connections between individuals who share common interests.
My Role
I spearheaded the user research phase of the project by orchestrating in-depth user interviews and meticulously crafting user personas. Through these efforts, I gained valuable insights into user needs, preferences, and behaviours, laying a solid foundation for informed decision-making throughout the project's lifecycle. This comprehensive approach to user research enabled a deeper understanding of our target audience, ultimately creating a more user-centric and effective solution.
Challenge
How can we create a product based solution that eliminates bot profiles and helps form meaningful connections?
Outcome
The app suggested connections based on shared interests with the help of recommendation system, using machine learning.
Design Journey squiggle, based on the process carried forward
The design process for Candid required much going back and forth, which I believe was vital for delivering a smooth-functioning product. The start of the journey was messy and involved learning a lot about the dating industry, which we continued doing till the end of the process.
the design journey; we started with a lot of information in hand, which proved to be quite helpful till the end of the process
User Interviews and Research Goals
Pain points and frustrations of dating app users
We decided to focus our target audience on working professionals. Our process began with developing research questions and then recruiting the target audience for interviews designed to address these inquiries.
setting up of interview questions and research goals for what we aim to achieve helped us stay grounded
affinity diagramming showcasing clusters forming themes found through the interview responses
What are the deal breakers?
After conducting interviews with dating app users, it became clear that privacy bot profiles were what they disliked the most about the apps. However, aside from the mentioned points, the participants also found it difficult to find people with shared interests and missed the fun aspect of online dating. While a considerable number of participants expressed enthusiasm for a dating app that facilitates initial interactions and fosters meaningful connections, there was also some hesitancy regarding the prospect of using multiple dating platforms simultaneously.
Key Takeaways
Bot profiles hinder the dating experience
Lack of matches with shared interests
Hard to start a conversation
So..
HMW
How might we create a platform that connects potential matches while considering the safety of the user and fostering easy communication between the matches?
Site Map and Structuring
of the app
Understanding the needs of the app, we decided to work on the structure of the app; what would it entail? what would the app look like?
The site map played a major role in understanding the screens that were to be designed and how a user would navigate through the app. It was also beneficial in explaining the needs of the app to the stakeholders and the developers.
Meet Sarah who wants to meet likeminded people and form meaningful connections
01 | Now let's walk through a feature that can help Sarah out
The storytelling approach through the user persona helped in weaving the strings together and understanding the features that could help users have an optimal online dating experience
Genuine Profiles
The verified sticker on the profile - helps in identifying genuine profiles on the app
Challenge
Dating apps are often infiltrated by bot profiles, which leads to uncertainty in matches and risks safety of the user
Approach
Candid employed several steps of verification before letting users get on the app; the steps included selfie and ID verification, prompting users to verify themselves. This added layer of security felt like the right choice for eliminating bot profiles to a certain extent
02 | Now let's walk through a feature that can help Sarah out
While the profile verification ensured a safe onboarding of the users, it was essential to have a feature that could enhance the dating experience.
Ice Breaker
The chat screens come with an icebreaker question, that a user can choose to send their potential match
Challenge
The thought of starting a conversation on dating apps feels daunting
Approach
The initial approach to easing a conversation was to have an ice-breaker question at the start of the chat, that a user could use as a starter
Further Visual Exploration
Below are some visual explorations created after the completion of the project. The focus for visual design was on exploration and building on my skillset as an experience designer. The activity sensitized me to the constraints a visual designer faces while building production-level designs.
Illustrations
I had the opportunity to make the illustrations as a part of the visual identity for the app, which was such a fun part of this project, apart from of course the research!
Learnings
This project was completed with a team with half its members in India and the other half in the United States. We had no experience working remotely in 2020, and working from home was foreign to us. Candid allowed me to work remotely with such a diverse team, how to address and understand perspectives, how to respect and manage time zone differences, and how to ensure collaboration with the founder.