Critic Case Study

The Critics App

Designing an end-to-end app for the ultimate movie, tv series and book lovers.

Challenge

While social media and websites such as Good Reads and Letterbox have been helpful in providing new recommendations, there’s currently no one-stop location to organize new movies, tv shows, and books to read and watch.

Solution

Design an app that allows users to collect movies, tv shows, and books recommendations to read/watch and motivate users to complete recommendations by adding in a social aspect.

UX Researcher
UX/UI Designer

2 weeks
(80 hours)

Figma
Maze.co
Whimsical

Empathize

I utilized two research methods to gather information about the current market and information about the current user experience of finding, saving and utilizing new entertainment recommendation.

Research goal: To better understand the current user journey of finding and enjoying new entertainment recommendations.

Competitive Analysis

I started by analyzing competitors to see what strengths, weakness and the similar capabilities were. With this analysis, I found that there are currently solutions for tracking movies watched, books read, and find new entertainment to indulge in. However, all of these websites are very specific to tv shows, books or movies only. Tehre is no one solution to track all entertainment.

User Interviews and Findings

Now that I had a better understanding of the current market, I wanted to better understand the user experience when finding new recommendations and completing them.

It’s clear that the participants struggle with keeping track of their watch/read list since there’s so many methods to gather new recommendations. Another theme that surfaced was that a lot of participants really liked connecting with others when finding new recommendations.

100%

5 out of 5 participants stated that they use multiple ways to track recommendations: notes app, screenshots, saves on social media, streaming platform watchlists, etc.

80%

4 out of 5 participants stated that they gravitate towards the recommendations of others with the same taste in entertainment as them through various methods: word of mouth, social media, the news. etc.

Define

User Journey Map

After developing a deeper understanding of the users’ needs and goals, I was able to create a user journey map to better illustrate the user journey and illuminate any pain points and opportunities.

Through this process, I was able to create HMW questions:

How might we help users better organize and keep track of their watch-lists and read-lists?
How might we motivate users to complete recommendations on their lists to prevent a large watch/read list?

Sitemap

Based on the data that was collected, I brainstormed, compiled and organized the information architecture into a sitemap.

Task Flows

I then created task flows to explore various paths the users could take when they engage with the app.

Ideate

Wireframes

After creating the sitemap and task flows, I began designing low-fidelity wireframes.

UI Kit

Before developing the high-fidelity wireframes, I created a design system to ensure that every screen is visually consistent.

Prototype

Final UI

Once the brand style and UI library was created, I turned the low fidelity wireframes into a high fidelity prototype.

Home Screen

This home screen displays what the user is currently watching to easily track their progress, access to the clubs that they’ve joined, and access to collections they’ve created and saved.

Discover

The Discover section allows users to find what’s trending, connect with other critics (app users), and find clubs to join.

Friends

The Friends section allows users to see other critic’s recent activity.

Clubs

The Critics App allows users to join clubs and connect with others who share the same interests as them. Users can join book clubs to help keep them accountable and engage in discussions. Along with book clubs, users can also join clubs that host watch parties. They can get together with others to watch weekly premiering episodes and movies or re-watch their favorite shows with others.

Test

Usability testing

I conducted seven usability tests using a high fidelity prototype of the Critics app.

There were two main tasks for the participants to complete:

Mark a show as completed
Add a new recommendation to their watch list

Research goal: To assess the overall usability of the app and identify any frustrations users may encounter when completing tasks

Insights and next steps

Insights

Overall, the participants all stated that the look and feel of the app is clean, very easy to navigate, had great UI, and would be something they’d love to use in real life. Some participants also stated that they really liked the idea of clubs and the social aspect of the app.

Iteration Opportunities

However, there were areas of improvement that surfaced. The biggest frustrations arose during the second task. Although 86% of the users were able to complete the task, there was a higher misclick rate and one user was unable to complete the task. One big insight was that some users preferred to add a new recommendation from visiting the collection page first then choosing to add a new title, rather than searching for the title before choosing a collection to add it to. Another theme that arose was some users had a difficult time finding the option to save the recommendation to a collection, since it was nested under the “more options” button. Overall, this really gave me clarity and helped me improve the user flow of this task.

Priority Revisions

Using the information gathered through usability testing, I made revisions to the app and created a final prototype

Button Findability

Since some users struggled with finding the option to save the title to a collection, I brought out the main options to the top level so that users do not have to go searching for the option to: start watching/reading, save to a collect, and recommend to other.

Before

After

Adding Another Pathway

To better allow for task success, I created the option to add recommendations when visiting a collection. This allows users to see what’s in a collection and be able to add more titles without leaving to another page.

Before

After

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