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DESIGN CHALLENGE

Influencd

This is a design challenge I put together for a company I applied for.

The Challenge

Create the onboarding screens for a matchmaking platform that connects influencers and e-commerce brands. The end goal of the platform is to help brands improve sales through influencers, and help influencers activate another channel of income (receiving commissions through affiliated sales).

 

Basic Requirements

 

  1. Jot down research insights

  2. Create user flow diagram

  3. Create wireframes

  4. Create high fidelity prototype + red lines for engineers

  5. Only design for desktop views

  6. 10 days to complete

Empathize

Problem Space

 

I recall watching HBO’s documentary “Fake Famous,” which is a social experiment to highlight how easy it can be to become a famous online “influencer" by creating content and purchasing followers. The online identities attracted real brand business partnerships, however due to the false online following this resulted in the loss of business revenue. I began to wonder how influencer-marketer partnerships are affected by the seeming lack of authenticity, ownership, and regulations surrounding these collaborations that take place online.

What if there is a way to easily connect influencers with marketers to create a more accessible and transparent relationship in order to drive profit for all participants?

Assumptions

We want to make note of any assumptions that usually I would invite the team to dive into with me - so we can make sense of the problem space. Some assumptions that were made are:
 

  • Marketers are aware of and worry about fake influencers.

  • Marketers have a hard time finding real influencers to work with.

  • Marketers want influencers with a massive amount of followers.

  • The online presence of a social media Influencer attracts “fake” businesses.

  • Influencers worry about fraudulent businesses scamming them.

Preliminary Research

I then conducted some "desk research" to learn more about the problem space.
 

Research Plan

Research Goals
 

  • Identify positive and negative experiences during the brand/ influencer search process.

  • Understand the pain points brands and influencers are experiencing with scammers.

  • Guage insights on how influencers and brands get authenticated.

  • Guage insights on positive and negative experiences using social media for business collaborations.

User Surveys
I created two different user surveys on Google Forms. One version is for influencers and another for Digital Marketers.

I reached out to 3 digital marketers I knew and 3 influencers I followed if they would like to volunteer to answer the survey.

Ideally, we would survey more participants, but given the time constraint, we couldn’t utilize the survey for quantitative data this time.

Define

Survey Analysis

 

I began to synthesize the results of the two surveys and grouped them into patterns and themes: 
 

  • Similar audience. Both influencers and marketers see value in partnering with each other if they both have the same target audience, and are both in the same industry.

  • Follower engagement. The amount of followers is not only important
    but the level of engagement from followers and how that determines an influencer’s authenticity.

  • AuthenticityInfluencers and businesses rely on some form of human interaction as a form of validation, whether it is in person or through communication. They rely on this validation because there is an awareness or even personal experience surrounding online scams.

  • Resource Loss. There is a loss of time and resources both parties experience in exchange for a promise of compensation and or exposure. 

Personas

Given the qualitative research we have, it’s important to create fictional characters, called
Personas, to really visualize Who we are designing for.

Influencer Persona

Influencer Persona.png

Marketer Persona

Marketer Persona.png

Journey Map


We want to create some journey maps into the current experience both Influencers and Marketers face today.

Influencer Journey Map

Influencer Journey Map.png

Marketer Journey Map

Marketer Journey Map.png

Ideate

Below I created an Influencer navigating the account creation & onboarding flow.

The orange boxes are Screens that a user views, the blue is the user’s action, and the grey triangle is the system decision (click the image for a closer look).

 

userflow.png

Prototype

After sketching and creating low-fidelity wireframes, I proceeded to create detailed mockups accompanied by a prototype. 
 

If you are interested in more details of this project, you can view it here

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