Saving Snapchat: A Case Study (Part 2)
This is Part 2 of this series. Click here to read Part 1.
Is there such a thing as too much data? Definitely not. For example, Amazon is known for being “data-obsessed,” but that has paid off for them extremely well. Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks and a judge on the TV show “Shark Tank” said:
“Amazon uses data better than anyone to achieve those goals for everything it sells. They have a chance to be the most dominant company in the world.”
Following in the mogul’s footsteps, I also turned to my data to see what I would find.
Here are my key findings from over 300 surveys and interviews:
62.4% of social media users are 21+ years old.
This was a big one, as Snapchat is notorious for catering to the Generation Z users, rendering the app almost unusable for millennials and Generation X users. I previously discussed how Snapchat needs to expand its user base to include the 25+ users, and this data supports that hypothesis. In order to grow, they need to find ways to incentivize older users to use their platform. And with that, also shed the stigma that their app is “only for kids.”
82.9% of Snapchat users log on everyday.
You might glance at that number and think it’s promising, but look at its competitors: 91.6% for Facebook and 89.9% for Instagram. Snapchat also needs to work on keeping users on the app — not have users download it but not use it.
When asked what their primary reason for using Snapchat was, 54.8% said to send photos to their closest friends and 35.7% said to contact friends.
I think Snapchat needs to keep these reasons in mind as they progress with their brand. The addition of “new and exciting” features has mostly gotten shade from its users (*cough* Snapcash *cough* Snap Map), and hasn’t positively contributed to their users’ experience.
When non-Snapchat users were asked what they primarily use social media for, 65.6% said to catch up on the news and current events and 56.3% said to contact friends.
The next step for Snapchat is to lure non-users into using their app. I honed in on what non-users are looking for in a social media app, and found that communication and news is what leads most people to using a social media platform. Keeping this in mind, I aimed to rethink Snapchat’s interface to prioritize these actions.
My next step was to create some user personas to focus my design on. User personas are used to:
- Determine what a product should do and how it should behave
- Build consensus and commitment to the design direction
- Communicate research findings to stakeholders to build understanding of the users
- Keep the design centered on users at every step of the process
- Help personalize the product for clients and employees
Basically, personas ensure that you avoid one of the most dangerous paths of design and instill the defining motto: You are not your user. After creating several characters (seriously, my user personas are more like mini screenplays), I narrowed it down to two. Meet Dubious Dave and Social Samantha.
I wanted to focus on the types of users that Snapchat needs to focus on: the ones that are starting to use Instagram more, and the ones that don’t use Snapchat. From these personas, I next created user journeys, which depict the stages of a user’s experience with a product, service, or ecosystem. This tool helps us further empathize with the user, so that we can find opportunities to make their journey better. For example, here’s Dubious Dave’s user journey:
As you can see from my aggressive use of emoji faces, his current journey isn’t very positive. That’s where we come in as user designers and aim to find solutions to the pain points.
So far, I have:
- Empathized with the users and developed a deep understanding of the challenge.
- Defined and clearly articulated the problem I want to solve.
By pure coincidence, these are the first two steps of the design thinking process — what a small world, eh? I’ve collected quantitative and qualitative data from a wide variety of users through my survey and interviews, and used this to curate my personas and user journeys.
What’s next? Ideation. The phase of the design thinking process where you brainstorm potential solutions, sketch them (disclaimer: I am by no means an artist to any degree), and conduct user testing to see if your concepts actually make sense to anyone other than yourself. Remember…
Until next time!
