Bonding college students through Bondit
Bondit Community Inc.
Mobile, B2C, Social media
2021-2022
Overview
Product
Bondit is a location-based social media app created for US college students to help them bond better with their college peers
Scope
User research, UI/UX design, usability testing, prototyping
Timeline
2021.07 ~ 2022.07 (12 months)Team
Team
1 UX Designer, 1 Product Director, CEO, 10 interns (UC Berkeley Idea Factory)
Background
Company description and business goal
Bondit is a startup company founded in 2020 by Ryan Pai and MIT graduates aiming to promote college networking amongst US college students
Bondit's goal is to increase the number of Monthly Active Users (MAU) and User Generated Content (UGC)
Problem statement
College freshmen find bonding with peers difficult via social apps. How might we help Gen-Z college students better bond with their peers through social apps?
How is this problem real?
Freshmen are nervous about sharing their real name or location in social apps due to privacy and safety concerns
Freshmen find a hard time finding peers with similar interests in social apps
Sources
User survey and interviews
Defining deliverables
Discover
Heuristic evaluation to figure out areas not following usability heuristics
User interviews to identify user pain points
Meeting with the CEO to better understand the business vision
Competitive analysis to discover competitive advantage
Define
Affinity diagramming to organize the user pain points
Discussing with the design team to define non-functional requirements and design principles
Updating information architecture based on user interview data
Syncing with the CEO once a week to discuss product vision
Iterate and testing
Develop
Created iteration once a week to share with the design team and the CEO
Created 20+ low-fidelity wireframes to explore designs that best serve user needs
Labeled each flow and developed multiple end-to-end flows
Deliver
Created designs based on user research insights, stakeholder alignment, and engineering sync on technical limitations
Conducted usability testing with the high-fidelity prototypes to figure out whether the design is in line with users’ needs
Calendar iteration
Before
Users can only view their class schedule and peers that take the same classes on a weekly basis
After
Users can see peers taking the same class, add events, and socialize based on their campus schedule
Board iteration
Before
Users hesitate to share ideas on the board with their real names due to privacy and safety concerns
After
The anonymous board feature categorized by interest groups encouraged users to be more engaged
Map iteration
Before
There’s no option to fully hide the user’s location to ensure user safety
After
Users can socialize safely by choosing to fully hide their location or go anonymous
Filter iteration
Before
Difficult to socialize with peers of similar interests based on college year alone
After
Users can bond with college peers of similar interests by joining open group chats on specific interests
Final design
Calendar
Schedule and socialize with classmates
Users can see peers taking the same classes or events with flexible time frames and engage with peers with similar schedules
Dashboard
Less pressure to share via an anonymous board
The anonymous board feature enables users to be more open and engaging within the app
Map
Safe socialization via user control on location-sharing
Users can safely socialize by having more control over the location-sharing feature
Group chat
Open chat with specific interest groups
Users can bond with college peers of similar interests by joining open group chats of specific interests
Impact
NYU users
50% of NYU freshmen use Bondit
Tufts users
75% of Tufts freshmen use Bondit
App Store rating
Marked 4.7/5.0 in the App Store
