SpotOut

A convenient solution to find your lost friends in music concerts without Internet

Role   Tools Timeline
Research, Ideation, Visuals, Sketch, Adobe XD, Jan - March 2018
Prototyping, User testing Illustrator, Photoshop

The Problem

As a concert enthusiast, I realized that it is very difficult to keep a track of your friends in music concerts. We usually plan to stick together but always bound to lose our friends at one point or another. Phones are always on the brink of dying because of the pictures we take, use internet, and, it is never convenient to call because of the loud music.

Research and Analysis

Starting to analyze about my own experience and preferences at music concerts, as well as additional user interviews and research I made several insights into user preferences and behaviors at concerts. Some main points I learned during this period include:

Considering that the user needs to save the battery, the closest connectivity option is to use GPS which does not require WiFi. The user just needs to spot his/her friend which can be done with GPS easily. Because the users are familiar with the texting/ calling, there should be a proper feedback of communication along with the GPS.

Ideation

What users care about when they are in a music festival? Definitely not about checking their random texts and calls several times. But definitely care about their lost friends, because it is no fun without their friends. The idea here was to find a solution which includes minimum usage of phone through GPS with no internet. The questions answered in this process were:

How will you inform your friends that you are lost?

Will your friend check his/her phone when you try contacting them?

What if your phone is not connected to internet?

Can you spot your friends clearly with just a single call/text message?

User flows

The user flows provided clarity on where we should focus our efforts in order to spot your friends quickly with minimum usage of phone and the necessary steps needed to design for. This helped me realize that constant feedback is necessary to communicate effectively.

Wireframes

Visual Design

Final Outcome

Reflection

I initially started this as a passion project because I have always had a hard time connecting with my friends at concerts. With the intention to learn more about product design and its design process, I had an opportunity to find a solution for this common problem observed by me. I began my journey to find that appropriate technology and solution that will not make you use your phone too much. I decided on BLE Beacons in the earlier stages, although it seemed to work well, I realized that it required a lot of investment and had various constraints. I revisited my solution to find a simpler solution which is compatible with the users’ mental model of texting/calling their friends. Although this was a long process, the whole journey was very interesting, and I learned how detail-oriented product design could get. Many blind spots get unfolded as the process proceeds. I also believe Agile methodology works best for solving a design problem and designing a product.

Previous versions using BLE Beacons

After several iterations and versions, I am satisfied with the current design after User testing with 5 users. There are some ongoing improvisations currently done to add more screens that will let the organizers add their events to the SpotOut and improve the user experience as well. However, the app still efficiently solves the problem of finding your friends quickly.