OVERVIEW of "KEEPSAKE"
Design proposal of print feature using customizable stickers for prints, cards and albums
STORY: If Instagram wanted to diversify its revenue stream beyond advertising, what would be way to allow users to customize and purchase physical versions of their photos directly from the app?
CHALLENGE: Create a research plan with a two-person team in two weeks for an in-app print feature we call "Keepsake"
DURATION: Two weeks in July 2016
BROAD GOAL: Understand the needs and behaviors of Instagram users. Find opportunities to provide support and extend the digital experience of Instagram into their physical world.
ROLE: Lead UX researcher, script writer, interview recruiter, qualitative user interviews, persona creator, user journey mapper, story boarder
TEAM: Collaborated with Andy Lu, UI Lead and Researcher
PLATFORM: Apple iOS
TOOLS: Pen and Paper, Sketch, Omnigraffle, Keynote, InVision, Google Sheets
RESEARCH METHODS: Competitive and Comparative Research using Heuristics, Contextual Inquiry, Qualitative User Interviews, Affinity Mapping, Persona Creation, Story Boards
RESEARCH
Competitive and Comparative Analysis
Top tier of competitive and comparative analysis, apps that have print products is photos, albums, cards
Second tier of comparative and competitive analysis. Snow like Snapchat uses "filters" and inspired the sticker idea.
RESEARCH
User Flows
Click through for user flow diagrams
KEEPSAKE USER FLOW
We wanted to keep the steps for Keepsake's user flow within 12-14. After finding the in-app print feature, the user should feel guided and be able to intuit and get "to the order page" quickly and painlessly.
RESEARCH
SURVEY
SURVEY GOALS
Wanted to narrow down potential interviews based on Instagram and Facebook users who kept or appreciated keepsakes
Wanted to see what people did for special occasions regarding photography, cards, albums, keepsakes
Wanted to get a sense of their digital presence online and how it translated to supported birthdays, holidays etc.
Wanted to see which was occasions were most aligned with printed keepsakes: birthdays, religious holidays etc.
RESEARCH
USER SURVEY TO INTERVIEWS TO AFFINITY MAPPING
12 interviews conducted in one day.
Script for User Interviews on Instagram usage. Click to enlarge.
A User Survey was sent out (using Google) to find potential candidates to interview. After 35 responses, we conducted 12 interviews in one day with Users who had Instagram accounts and varied in degree of how private or public accounts.
Interviews in person are better for the UX researcher to read not only verbal but body language responses. Following a script of questions, we took a deeper dive in person to hear the "why" behind the answers.
After the Interviews:
AFFINITY MAPPING
Affinity mapping is method where the UX researcher typically writes insights or behaviors on post-it notes using a color system to find patterns amongst users behaviors. We find the needs, the roots of behaviors and the emotions that drive users. By grouping these aligned behaviors, needs and emotions, we can group them into "personas".
Cards were preferred but texting felt more personal than a Facebook post. Instagram posts for birthdays were considered "too public" and "cheesy or trendy" by some users.
Users liked the process of "creating" personalized gifts especially if they were funny.
Users needed to streamline and parse their process of making "photo albums" otherwise they felt "overwhelmed" and let it pile up and didn't keep up with the tasks.
After Affinity Mapping:
PERSONAS
A "persona" is a grouping of similar behaviors and needs by multiple users (3-5 in this case) who keep the design focused on user needs but makes our goals more human-focused versus just serving the pattern of needs and behaviors. A persona is the combination of different people's needs and behaviors. By giving the patterns of needs and behaviors a name, a family, feelings and goals, we serve the "people" behind a segment of the target audience.
For Keepsake, we found and focused on 3 personas based on "public and private" behavior.
1. Primary Persona: Penny L. @pennycupcakes (public account)
2. Secondary Persona: Alex S. @cafeconcleche (public account)
3. Tertiary Persona: Tiffany L. @pikapika21 (private account)
Primary Persona: @pennycupcakes
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Secondary Persona: @cafeconleche
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Tertiary Persona: @pikapika21
Persona Needs
How personas lead to feature prioritization: User needs of persona Penny Lane below. These insights directly lead to opportunities and validates the need of a Print feature like "Keepsake"
Primary Persona User Needs: @pennycupcakes
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Secondary Persona User Needs: @cafeconleche
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Tertiary Persona User Needs: @pikapika21
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STORYBOARDS
Capturing emotional journeys of Users Storyboards and User Journeys for Personas help the UX researcher and designer to connect to the "life" and "feelings" and "key moments for conversion" for the use of the print feature like "Keepsake"
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LOW TO HIGH FIDELITY PROTOTYPE for "KEEPSAKE"
The app map for "Keepsake". This project occurred before Instagram added the "Stories" feature. The icon for "Keepsake" would appear under each image in the newsfeed. There would also be settings that would be specific for the print feature.
Keepsake for Instagram:
LOW FI PROTOTYPE: ITERATION 1 TO 2
Refining the low-fi prototype to create a good user flow and logical intuitive steps can be quick and dirty.
In the first week, we started our low-fi prototype and in the second week started the process of refinement by testing with users we had interviewed when possible and others.
KEY TAKEAWAY: Constant communication is essential if different team member spear-head different aspect. In our case, Andy developed the UI and the prototype and I led the research. In our excitement from finding insights or developing ideas independently, we had to reconcile some ideas at the end.
Andy believed that users would want to print from people who they followed or were "mutual followers" and was inspired by VSCO's community, another photo sharing app. On the other hand, I wasn't sure that our users and our research had indicated this was a need. We accounted for this in the second iteration of the low-fi prototype by giving users the ability to lock photos from being printed.
I'm not sure if that was the best conclusion. With a two-week sprint, it was necessary at the time, to keep moving forward.
COMMUNICATION: We used Slack, texted and called all day and through the weekends. We ate lunch together for two weeks and developed a healthy respect for each other's approaches and abilities.
Andy is a Millenial and I'm a Gen Xer. I know I'm not supposed to use these monikers but let's face it Millenials get a bad rap. I would say after these projects, I understand them.
Keepsake for Instagram:
HIGH FI PROTOTYPE
(2 min video)
(This feature was proposed before Instagrams's Stories feature)
1. START 00:00 to 00:25 = News feed and settings for acount,
Who gets to print the photos?
2. 00:25 to 00:35 = Selecting type of print and quantity.
3. 00:35 to 00:44 = Quick slideshow
4. 00:45 to 01:07 = Selecting a photo
5. 1:08 to 01:23 Customization using holiday stickers
6. 01:24 to 01:42 Sending to recipient using Contacts
7. 01:43 to 01:44 Shipping options
8. 01:45 to 01:49 Quantity
9. 01:50 to 01:55 Editing Shipping and Submitting Order
10. END: Confirmation Page and Share on Social Media.