JESSICA BLITZ ROBISON
Product Designer, Creative Leader, UX Strategist,
Solver of Sticky Problems, Veteran Start-Up Designer, Brainstorm Enthusiast, and NYT Cooking Loyalist .
Mama Gathr App
Strategy & Concept work
The Problem:
Moms need a way to meet similar and like-minded moms in their area. Scheduling play-dates that fit in their busy life is often hard to
co-ordinate with other busy moms.
Their Motivation:
- children to activities and other kids their age.
- get out of the house and meet moms with same age kids that work with their work schedule
Objective & Goals:
The goal of this is to find a way for busy parents to connect with existing and future friends with children of similar age, in near by location, to get out of the house and meet up for play-dates and activities.
Target Audience:
Busy mothers of young children who work part-time, from home, or full-time.
- live in the city or suburbs
- want to get out of the house
- one reason or another do not have a lot of local friends
check out the prototype here or by click the iPhone mock up!
Competitor Analysis Matrix
Looking at other social media platforms that are either local, parental based, and forums.
Primary Persona
Laura, 33, Roslindale, MA
working mother with limited time off
mother of a 18 month old boy, Cooper
works 4 days a week as a CNP
Cooper in daycare 4 days a week, and home 1 day a week
"I don't have a lot of local friends with kids and when I am home with my child I want to have quality time with them, since I can not give them quantity of time"
Challenges:
"Co-ordinating play-dates around nap times and other peoples schedules is next to impossible."
"Finding activities on the days I am free is hard since most activities are on the same days of the week as each other, which are not my day off. "
"I had a preemie so could not go new mom groups, because of that I did not make many local mom friends. "
Goals:
I want to meet other moms who have similar parenting style as me, they do not to be the same, but I donít want a santimommy friend.
I want my child to participate in the activities that SAHM moms get to do on the day I am home with them.
Behaviors and habits:
I work four 10 hour days and Cooper is at daycare during that time. When I get home I am tired and have barely enough time for our daily routine, never mind getting some downtime to myself. I am too tired to go out after bedtime and would rather just watch tv or clean the house up a bit.
On the day I am off, which is wednesday, there are no local activities since they tend to be on tuesdays or thursdays. I sometimes schedule a play-date but often times it does not work out since his nap schedule is different than other kids. I am not originally from Texas, most of my friends are back home. I go to the park a lot on our day off but wish I had a mom friend to meet up with so I could socialize and chat about our kids, or the latest episode of Game of Thrones.
On weekends I never know who is around, and assume people are busy. We usually end up doing something on our own again.
Main User Tasks
Scenario #1
User Goal: to find a new friend using the mama match
Task Scenario Use the Gathr Mama app to match with other users
Scenario #2
User Goal: invite a mom to connect through browsing the local mothers
Task Scenario Use the Gathr Mama app browse and connect with moms based on your location
Scenario #3
User Goal: host a play date
Task Scenario Use the Gathr Mama app to host a play-date with your friends
User Story
Laura a 31 year old mom from the suburbs of Boston, she wants to get out of the house with her young child and do something with other moms. She has limited free time because she works part-time but still wants to get out on her days off (when the kids aren't napping) and take them out with one or a few local moms for a play-date. But she doesnít know many people in the area.
Total Feature Inventory
social login
user profiles
parenting style quiz
parenting style compatibility algorithm
availability in profile
schedule sync from ical
schedule sync from google calendar
photo upload from phone
photo upload from fb and IG
activity calendar
filter calendar by date,time,distance, age
user summited activity
vendor submitted activities
activity autoload from hula frog
a.a from macaroni kid
a.a from paid activity sponsor (i.e gymboree, my gym, goldfish swim etc.)
sync friends from fb, twitter, IG
sync friends from email contacts
search friends by name
search friends by email
search by phone number
message friends
group messaging
user can leave group message
users can add members to message
notification dashboard to personalize how and what notifications user gets
push notifications
email notifications
text notification
mama matching
swipe to match
list view mama matches
grid view mama matching
send friend request near by ( like snapchat)
send friend request with pURL
local community forum
sub group forums
user created forums
see group events in calendar
Feature Prioritization
mama matching -
This feature is to find new friends to connect with, it is one of the things that makes this app unique and solves for the issue of moms not having an existing network .
play-date finder -
This feature allows users to set up play-dates with existing friends and see who is free when they as well as message multiple people at once.
sync friends from contacts -
Allows users to easily add existing friends to the app and invite people who have no joined yet. This is the quickest way to start building your network.
user profiles -
Allows users to learn bout new people, and also tell people about themselves. In here they will have pictures, information about where they live, how many kids they have, their availability etc...
parenting style quiz -
This will allow users to see how compatible they might be with new moms. They will fill out questions about their parenting style and how strict they adhere to this style. This will help weed out moms who the person may not get a long with or have anything in common besides the age of their children.
upload photos -
Allows user to easily showcase who they are without having to label themselves. Also personalizes the experience and allows others to get quick glance at who they are. Plus when it is time to meet up they will have a sense of who they are meeting.
swipe to match -
A fun, addictive, and quick way to surface mamas that they might want to connect with it set up play-dates in the future. Also allows user to focus on one match at a time.
messaging -
Allows users who are connected already and new connections to start a dialog, plan a play-date, and invite non mutual connections.
Final User Flow
