Adding a feature to help virtual conference goers feel more connected.
Background

As a new designer, one of the most challenging concepts to grasp has been “design is never done”. At the same time, realising this is true can be a massive opportunity to continuously make products outdo themselves. This project was all about doing that for the virtual conferencing tool hopin. Hopin has seen incredible success the past 2 years — enabling companies to use its white-label software to host conferences online. I set out to develop a feature to make this already amazing tool even better. I didn’t set out with a feature in mind, but started with researching the company, tool, and virtual conferencing space.
Challenges

Trying to make an incredible feature better wasn’t as simple as I thought it would be. I spent a long time brainstorming to try to come up with a feature that would address some kind of problem hopin’s existing (and incredibly satisfied) customers were having. My saving grace through this? Research, research, research.
What I Accomplished

Identified pains hopin users had that the tool wasn’t addressing completely
‍
Built a curation & connectivity feature (The Curator) based on user pains
‍
Implemented the feature into hopin’s existing design
‍
Type
Adding a Feature
Role
Research & UX/UI
Timeline
May - June 2021

01 Research

Creating Research Goals

Identify primary pain points felt by hopin users
Establish the severity of primary pain points by their occurring frequency
Isolate single greatest pain point felt by hopin users
Uncover potential remedies hopin users may like to address pain
Uncover potential remedies hopin users may like to address pain

Understanding The Space

Hopin At a Glance

Market Learnings

01 Reduction Goals
All UK supermarkets have large
plastic packaging reduction goals

02 Non-Recyclable
50% of their current plastic
packaging is not recyclable

03 Increasing Demand
Consumer demand for sustainable alternatives is steadily increasing

The Competition

What's the
competition up to?

01 Dated Sites
Existing competitor sites lack style & modern feel to attract new generation

02 Limited Options
Only one direct competitor, giving acet an opportunity to capture the market

03 Not Reusable
Most competition doesn't offer
reusable options

Understanding Our Users

Diving Deeper

Company, market and competitive research revealed that hopin was nearly perfect. It had grown incredibly fast in 2 years, amassing hundreds of millions in funding and scoring an average 4.7/5 across hundreds of customer reviews. For a moment, I thought I had picked an impossible product to improve on. But there was a glimmer of hope. I noticed a trend among ‘cons’ sections of customer reviews. It seemed that first-time hopin users had difficulties getting up to speed and making the most of the tool. Considering that there were hundreds of reviews on hopin already available, I knew this would be a quick, not to mention cost-effective, way to dive deeper on user pains that were associated with the platform.

Even Deeper

The review deep dive was the start of something. A small crack started to show in what first appeared to be a perfectly sound hull. I went a step further and spoke to some of hopin’s users to flesh out this potential pain point a bit more.
Interview Goal 01

Who is the user?
Age, status, location...
Interview Goal 02

Are they comfortable with
tech & remote work?
Interview Goal 03

How was their last
hopin experience?
Interview Goal 04

How do they like
to learn new tech?
Linda
23, Student, Greece
“hopin was great, but a feature that helps first timers get onboarded would be really useful — it was a bit confusing during the first hour or two”
“I use a lot of technology, and it was a bit challenging for me because of how many features are available — you almost have too many options”
Skirman
24, Employed, Lithuania
George
38, Employed, London
“It’s a really slick tool, but it would be nice having a bit more time to get accustomed to everything that’s available on the platform”
“It’s always tough learning how to use a new piece of tech — I usually need someone to walk
me through it and then I’m okay on my own”
Helen
29, Employed, London
Jessica
49, Employed, London
“Networking was a great feature, but it still didn’t feel like an in-person conference, there’s
a feeling of being disconnected from people”
Primary User Needs

01 Onboarding

Especially for first-time users, a quick and simple walkthrough of the tool

02 Direction

Guidance on where to go and what to do without needing to decide

03 Connectivity
The feeling that despite being online, you’re in the room with people
Primary User Pains

01 Confusion

Not knowing how to operate a new tool to its full extent

02 Choice

Too many options, not knowing where to spend your time

03 Isolation

Online conferencing can't replicate the feeling of being with people
Key Takeaways
5Users would like a
quick onboarding
experience
Instead of jumping in
head first, users like the idea of having an onboarding experience or guide the first time they use a new tool.
5Users wanted to feel more connected
to other attendees
Being remote all the time gives users a sense that they aren’t dealing with people any more, just faces on a monitor.
4Users like being
guided by an
expert
Users are most comfortable with a new tool or feature when someone personally explains it to them or walks them through it.

02 Define

Meet Alex

To step further into the user’s shoes, I developed a persona. Alex was very familiar to me — I had worked with countless Alex’s, and it didn’t take long for me to understand his needs, pains and habits. Alex works for a London-based tech company, heading up a product team. His company is considered a thought leader in its space, so Alex makes it a point to keep his team updated on market trends by having them attend the occasional conference.

The team likes using tools such as Zoom and Hangouts to connect, but Alex still looks for platforms that won’t be tough to grasp. Perhaps his greatest concern, since his team is 100% remote, is that they might feel disconnected from each other. So, Alex is always investigating options for helping his team stay in touch, and feel like they work with humans, not just faces on a monitor.

Asking The Right Questions

How Might We…
‍ Improve Alex & his team's ability to quickly grasp all available features on the platform?
How Might We…

Give them a greater sense of connectivity to other conference attendees?
How Might We…

Structure an onboarding feature that gives them a greater sense of connectivity?
Key Takeaways
Users want first-time help with a new tool, while feeling more connected to each other
The feature started coming to life. I knew it would need to involve some kind of onboarding experience, while not making users feel like they were just engaging with more tech but rather engaging with
something personal and human.

03 Ideate

Brainstorming The Feature

Research Thesis

Hopin is a great tool already, but research shows that new users
have a tough time navigating the platform. Users also feel disconnected from one another since the platform is virtual. A new feature should address both of these pain points.
Primary Feature Idea
A ‘guide’ or virtual assistant that helps users navigate the platform and decide how to use it. At the same time, this guide shows personality & helps users connect with other conference attendees.
At What Point?

Upon entry to
the platform
Volume?
‍
Make it option
for accessibility
Schedule?
‍
Help users create
a schedule
Conversation Design Principles
Cooperative
Goal-Oriented
Context-Aware
Quick & Clear
Turn-Based
Truthful
Polite
Error Tolerant
The Feature
“The Curator”

A personal guide that helps conference attendees navigate the hopin platform. The Curator helps them create a schedule for the day, and connects them with attendees they might know or might want to get to know.

The Curator's Flow

Deciding where the ‘Curator’ would go in hopin’s experience was straightforward. He would be accessible to conference attendees as soon as they entered their conference. So, I mapped out the flow of how attendees would engage with the Curator and how he would help them navigate the platform.

04 Prototype

Keeping It Low Fidelity
Since every conference has unique branding, I designed the curator using low fidelity wires to ensure the feature would retain hopin’s white-label offering.

I tried keeping the style of the curator simple to match hopin’s existing UI, while also having the feature stand out enough to be noticed by users upon entry to their conferences.

I created a prototype in Figma using my low-fidelity wireframes. The goal was to keep testing unbiased to branding.

05 Testing

After incorporating The Curator with hopin’s platform, it was time to test my feature’s functionality. I sourced 5 participants from my professional network, none of whom had used hopin previously. I wanted to know whether my feature improved a first-time user’s experience. My prototype remained low-fidelity for the test, since I didn’t want users to focus on branding instead of the feature’s functionality. During testing, I also made sure to gauge whether users felt connected to other conference attendees. The goal, after all, was to help attendees connect and feel a ‘human presence’ during the conference.
Goal 1 Test overall feature functionality & ease of use
Goal 2 Identify any hurdles users face during feature use
Goal 3 Uncover any desired changes users may want with feature
Goal 4 Assess whether feature improves usability of platform
Goal 5 Assess whether feature improves connectivity for users

Scenario & Results

You’re attending a virtual conference that’s being hosted on a platform called hopin. You’ve never used the platform before, and you don’t have a set-in-stone schedule, but you’re excited to attend the conference since it’s about your work. Furthermore, you hope to get as much out of the day as you can.
Key Takeaways
3‍
Immediately closed
the feature
The pop-up feel of the curator made users want to close out of it — users didn’t trust the pop-up
4‍
Didn't want to
connect socials
At this early stage of using hopin, users didn’t trust the platform enough to want to connect their social accounts
4‍
Wanted more
input for curation
Users liked the curation feature, but wanted to give more input to influence the outcome in their favour
3
Wanted to meet
similar attendees
Instead of connecting socials, users suggested being able to meet/connect with attendees that had similar curation results

Learning From Feedback

Before
After
Users really didn’t like the fact that The Curator spoke in ‘pop-ups’. The new design shows The Curator sharing similar formatting to the rest of the page, keeping visual elements similar to establish that the feature is part of the hopin experience.
Before
After
Rather than having The Curator create a schedule for users based on no visible input from them, the feature become more interactive and allowed users to provide input on their interests before receiving a curated schedule.
Before
After
Initially, users had to connect their social accounts to see who they may already know at the conference. During testing, users wanted to avoid connecting socials. Several users made a  suggestion of having The Curator enable them to meet conference goers with similar schedules. This way, they’d meet new people with similar interests. On the right, users can ‘Edit Schedule’, ‘Meet Similar People’, or ‘Head To Next Event’.

06 UI & Branding

UI & branding for hopin was a bit different from other projects. The tool comes as a white label package, meaning every company that uses it will have its own branding incorporated into their conference.

As such, I decided to leave my designs in low/mid-fidelity to not detract from hopin’s true business model. I wanted my feature to be integrated with the structure of the tool and work well from an operational standpoint rather than a branding one.

07 Final UI

Reception - Curator Greeting
Provide Curation Input
Edit Your Schedule
Meet Similar Attendees
See The Prototype

08 Next Steps

Next Steps

Considering the feedback from usability testing, next steps for The Curator would definitely involve further testing. My first version of The Curator fell short, so I would want to ensure the changes I made do a better job of satisfying user needs.

Following further testing and iteration, I would develop an integration plan. This would involve working with the broader product team at hopin to ensure The Curator fits in to hopin’s existing platform. From there, a ‘pilot’ or 'test' conference could be used to assess how an actual conference goes with The Curator as a live feature. Throughout this process, further observation would be key in noting how users respond to The Curator. Ultimately, hopin's product team should run routine testing on their platform to ensure the curator (and other features) continue satisfying user needs and alleviating user pains.

Learning 01 Without Testing There's No Point

Above all else, this project taught me the importance of usability testing. What I initially thought was a brilliant feature turned out not to satisfy most of my user’s needs. Only by testing my feature on my target audience was I able to determine that it needed iteration to achieve its purpose. Although it can be frustrating to go through an entire design process only to discover that what you’ve designed doesn’t work, I realised that this is precisely what it means to be a designer. Ego has to stay at the door and the needs of the user have to remain at the forefront. Ultimately, it was incredibly satisfying to learn precisely why the first version of The Curator wasn’t working for my audience, and it showed me how to move forward to turn the feature into a superior product.

Learning 02 No Product Is Perfect

Perhaps the most difficult thing to face during this process was how good hopin already was as a platform. During the research phase, I started to doubt whether I’d be able to add anything to this rock star of a platform that would bring value to its users. For a moment, that was very discouraging. But by sticking to the process, I ended up uncovering some real user pains and frustrations that I was able to address (at least in part) with my feature. The learning was that nothing is ever perfect or finished, even though it may seem that way. This is an extremely encouraging takeaway, and has altered my perspective on products that I previously deemed ‘perfect’. I’m beginning to investigate options for improving anything and everything, which is making me feel more equipped to tackle design projects moving forward.
Thanks for reading!

Check out my other work below.
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