- UX Vision
- People seek companionship.
Can we assist with getting over the awkward introduction?
What if we could reground companionship in the physical world by connecting others at the same geolocation as the user?
Brainstorm, surveys and interviews
We created 2 different user roles based on our experiences and assumptions of the dating scene during our brainstorm. The user roles were 'Active' and 'Passive' daters. After, we asked ourselves what these users 'desired', 'wanted' and/or 'already had'. From this, we labeled each affinity group, creating a survey to see if people identified with any of our personality traits. We targeted college aged millenials in our survey because we identified them to be our core userbase.
Brainstorm
We asked ourselves, "What are the characteristics of people who date?" From that we created an affinity diagram. This is one of the groups that formed.
Anonymous Survey
Do people identify with the labels we created in our brainstorm? We posted fliers with links to our survey at CalTech, ArtCenter and Pasadena College.
Interviews
Digging deeper into how people used existing dating platforms, we discovered discreteness was a big factor in in-person dating.
Before Apple Watch
Red Cord was initially designed for the Android ecosystem (before Material Design). The watch interface was started from scratch because of the lack of human interface guidelines to reference. We wanted to ensure the watch aspect of Red Cord was not tech for tech's sake. Therefore, we iterated on the watch interface with insights from our user tests. We had users interact with the phone prototype before completing the flow on the watch to give them better context.
Android Wear
Red Cord was initially designed for the Moto 360. We created our interface from scratch due to the lack of Android Wear interface guidelines.
No Human Interface Guidelines
We experimented with gestures on the watch, as well as seeing how the watch could maintain parity with the experience on the phone.
MatchFind
We first sought to emphasize interest overlaps. Testers overwhelmingly mentioned they wanted the first read to be the person's profile image.
Contacting the Person
We tried gestures, an action sheet as well as persistent buttons. We went with persistent buttons to free up gestures for navigation.
Creating Icebreakers
We decided to keep Icebreaker creation exclusive to the phone. Instead, users select from the ones they've created previously on the phone.
Sending an Icebreaker
There is a short countdown before the user's Icebreaker is sent. We wanted to visualize this vs. using text.
Receiving an Icebreaker
We eliminated as much text and tapping as possible. When the user receives an Icebreaker, a modal appears where they can accept/decline or view their profile.
Illustrated use case
What kind of ways could people use the product? We visualized multiple persona based scenarios to figure out. The scenario shown here describes how Red Cord assists people with discovering others at the same geolocation by demonstrating how the phone and watch modals are utilized in the context of a bar environment. We chose the bar because we see Red Cord working effectively in an inherently social environment. We illustrate the outcome of a meetup in the video, Serendipity, below.
At the bar
Kevin walks into a bar and thinks to himself, "Maybe theres someone around me with Red Cord."
People nearby
Kevin sees there are a number of people nearby. Red Cord displays only people with similar interests to Kevin.
Browsing
Kevin is checking out profiles. It seems like he has found someone who piques his interest!
Sending an invitation
Kevin decides to send an invitation to Linda Park. Linda and Kevin share an interest in Star Wars.
The ping
At the other end of the bar, Linda receives a notification from Red Cord.
Score
It seems like Kevin is in luck because Linda likes what she is seeing. She accepts Kevin's invitation!
Back at ya'
Kevin's watch notifies him that Linda has accepted his invitation to talk.
Bringing them together
Kevin glances at his watch, which displays a compass helping them to find each other.
Action!
Adjusting Light
The Shoot
Equipment
Filming the Watch
