Porpoisely App — The Netflix of Publishing for UX/UI-ers
Find Your UX/UI Career Purpose
The Intro
I find many aspects of user experience (UX) really interesting but for the longest time, I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted to specialize in. Well, I’m still not entirely sure….but after reading articles on UX research and hearing from professionals in the industry, I think that UX research is definitely something that I would like to really get into. With research, you’re able to design products that, hopefully, help you make the right design choices to meet the users’ needs. Research is basically the holy grail of UX.
The Big Question
Where can people who aren’t entirely sure about what they would like to do in UX go, to learn more about the possible career paths?
If you Google “user experience”, the first website that appears in the search is Nielsen Norman Group.
Nielsen Norman Group’s is a great resource for anyone wanting to learn more about user experience. But the one turnoff for me is that it’s way too text heavy. Personally, I feel like the Nielsen Norman Group’s website experience could be more enjoyable if they had more visual elements (sort of like Medium’s website).
Medium is a great platform for UX/UI-ers to find content related to user experience but what if there was an easier way for people to find even more content specifically on user experience?
The Challenge
Deliver content to a new channel
What if there was a Netflix of publishing for UX/UI-ers?
This question got me thinking about how I could improve the overall process of finding good resources related to UX/UI. This was when I began conceptualizing my app, Porpoisely.
The Story Behind Porpoisely
As an upcoming UX/UI-er, I’ve been wanting to learn more about the field and how I could better prepare myself for it. But for a broad field like user experience, at times, it can be difficult to know what you think you would like to do. What if there was an app that helped you narrow down your career purpose?
Ideation
With this challenge, the possibilities of delivering content through a new platform are endless but I knew right from the start that I wanted to create some type of app specifically for UX/UI-ers that would help them learn more about user experience. I needed a way to transfer and present my thoughts to visual elements so I immediately wrote down all of my ideas on paper:
Why the Porpoise?
I wanted a catchy name for the app and since “porpoisely” kind of sounds like “purposely”, I thought that having a porpoise as a logo would be a good fit for the overall message and goal of the app — finding your UX/UI career “porpoise.” ;)
The Audience
The primary audience of my user experience publication streaming app, Porpoisely, would be aspiring UX/UI-ers, specifically college students who are studying UX/UI or a related field.
The reason why a persona (like Jamie) would be a good fit for this particular channel is because there’s UX/UI-specific content for her. Through this channel, she wouldn’t have to go to multiple platforms because all types of content from articles, books, to videos on user experience would be available all in one place.
The Need
There needs to be a better way to help upcoming UX/UI-ers to gain access to unlimited UX/UI related content so that they can learn more about the field and figure out their career purpose, their path.
The Goal
Give UX/UI-ers a new and easier way to stream and consume unlimited content on user experience so that they can explore, learn, and find their career purpose.
The Why
The reason why this is the right platform for my potential users to engage in this channel is because all of the content that would be on this app would be specifically catered to them. When they first create a profile, they would have to select interests in user experience so that the content that appears when they open up the app would be more relevant to them. In a way, it’s like how you select your interests/passions on Flipboard or Pinterest.
The Implementation
Once I figured out what my goal with Porpoisely was going to be, I then moved onto designing and developing the app.
User Experience Journey
To get things flowing, I mapped out a user experience journey of how my primary user would interact with my content. This is what it looked like on my whiteboard:
After outlining the draft of my user experience journey on my whiteboard, I then went to the Sketch program and recreated it so that it would be more detailed and legible.
Features
After researching reading, music, and video apps, I decided to include the following features in my app:
- Content Creation
- Filter/Sort Option
- Search
- Bookmark
- Collections
- Like
- Follow
- Share
Currently, my go-to platform for UX/UI related content has been Medium. I enjoy using Medium but there are a few pain points that I wish I could improve on this platform. I ended up taking some features from Medium for this app, but I also included more features like the option to add collections and to filter/sort your content.
Like Medium, the biggest feature for Porpoisely would be content creation. You would be able to create your own stories and publications so that you could share it with other UX/UI enthusiasts. Unlike Medium, though, you’ll be able to organize your content better because you would be able to create different collections and tags within your own account. By creating collections, you could use the filter/sort option to find the content that you need more efficiently, without having to scroll through everything that you’ve created, liked, or bookmarked. You’ll end up saving a lot of time!
Lo-Fi Wireframes
Hi-Fi Wireframes
Style Guide
Surface Comps
Walkthrough
Prototype
To view the latest prototype of Porpoisely, check it below:
Final Thoughts
Porpoisely is definitely an app that I would like to follow through with in the future. I hope that it would someday help UX/UI-ers to narrow down their career paths and to find their “porpoise.”
As always, thanks for reading!
/Ellie
