Foodeo App
Foodeo is a mobile app concept I designed to help users explore and share their favourite food places around them. (UIUX | Product Design).
Overview:
Drawing inspiration from apps with location base features; Zenly, Google Maps, the design exploration aims to explore the possibility of making location “social”.
This is inspired by the themes of Social plus, which is a term coined by Andreessen Horowitz. The theme essentially proposes that by integrating a social layer into an existing industry, we can create a superior product experience.
The idea is that a network/ community of passionate users can create even more value out of a product. It frames that the activity will no longer be just about utility but community and ‘tribes’.
An excerpt from A16z:
“Just as every industry makes the crucial transition from analog to digital, nearly every category of the company will eventually make the fateful transition from single-player to multiplayer, from company-driven to community-driven, from individual to social.”
To read more about the concept of social Plus: https://a16z.com/social-strikes-back/
To further understand the opportunity of Food + social:
I created storyboards of scenarios and sketched different interaction patterns for discovering food-places (the where, when, how, why…)
I analysed the current structure of solutions. I dived into user pain points, their complaints about existing solutions, and their native mode of media consumption.
After gaining insights into user’s consumption and understanding leading social product inspirations, I worked on:
– Problem discovery
– Design sprinting, planning and weekly reviews)
– UX analysis (flows and persona)
– Design (Mobile App and Branding)
– Lo-fi prototyping (basic flow and interactions)
I found an opportunity to include fun visuals elements into social sharing.
In this case, I experimented with using Emojis as review mechanics, because they fulfil the novelty and utility factor of being expressive, fun to use yet useful at a glance.
I bought the prototype out and spoke to 2 different age group of potential users. (14- 18 years old) & (18- 26 years old).
Both of these age groups represent slightly different consumption behaviours, novelty appeal and social media behaviour.
Upon different iterations in form factor, I have found that there is a group of users that are excited about the product design potential and utility of sharing places with friends.
However, there is an equal group of users (especially in the 18-26 years old) who believe that food is too limited of a use case to share.
This insight helps me dive further into the concept of social sharing.
Conclusion: Social plus remains a very interesting intersection between user behaviours, social and utility, however food discovery as a standalone value proposition will not be enough to kickstart a valuable network given the power of existing social products (Tik Tok, Instagram, Facebook).
This design exploration was very valuable in helping me explore different design mechanics in improving product novelty and product use case. At present- more iterations in a different use cases will be needed to craft out a more valued user experience.