Reddit: Designing the Reddit Events Calendar for Native iOS
2018 • USER INSIGHTS • UX • UI • PRODUCT DESIGN • NATIVE IOS
PROJECT OVERVIEW
About Reddit Events
In late 2018, Reddit launched a Reddit Events — and to put it simply, an “event” on Reddit is a scheduled post with a start and end time. The product was launched as it’s well known that users visit Reddit for news-worthy events — which range from breaking news in politics, entertainment, sports and so forth to trending memes and AMAs (short for “Ask Me Anything”). The concept of an “event” on Reddit falls perfectly into these use cases.
The Problem
However, the problems lie in the fact that: (1) It’s nearly impossible to discover upcoming events happening on Reddit; and, (2) When an event is happening — whether it be an AMA, a live sports game thread or a post-television show discussion — users may forget that Reddit has great content on happenings of the sort or even that an “event” has just occurred.
The overarching goal of this project is to design a Reddit Events calendar on native iOS, which allows users to not only know when events are happening in communities they’re following, but also to give them the option of discovering and following any event (live or scheduled) on Reddit.
Results & Solutions
Designed the MVP and future versions of a Reddit Events calendar that allows for both following, unfollowing as well as discovery.
Designed and mapped out multiple entry points for each user’s Reddit Calendar.
Role & Timeline
Owned the entirety of the project as the main Product Designer, while working with a PM and a team of engineers
The native iOS calendar was designed in 3 weeks.
THE DESIGN PROCESS
I. Discovery
Industry Trends
User Insights
Provisional Persona
INDUSTRY TRENDS
While Reddit Events aren’t technically “physical” events for people, they are similarly temporal happenings — but simply ones online. I began my research by both finding inspiration on Dribbble, as well as looking at native products that post about events happening around the world. A few I focused on analyzing were Facebook Events and Eventbrite — studying their flows, IA and calendar layout UIs.
USER INSIGHTS
For validation’s sake in order to push forward the creation a new product — below is some real-life data on how screenviews vary (and peak) at times during important moments within the (use case) context of the NFL.
Our team also conducted prior user research to understand the general needs of consumers, subreddits that correlate and how these needs and can span across the entirety of Reddit’s subreddit universe. I took the research, and narrowed it down to the major needs that align with “events” and the need for a calendar.
Considering both the novelty of this product within the Reddit context, as well as how users already interact with “events” on social networking platforms that they’re used to — this research helped to: (1) Develop a provisional persona, (2) Define necessary features, and (3) Map out the IA.
PROVISIONAL PERSONA
II. Define
Core Features
Information Architecture
User Flow
Defining necessary core features
Based on the user research conducted and our provisional personal, Mr. Daniel, our team decided upon a list of features necessary for the Reddit Events Calendar on native.
INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE
The overarching information architecture for the mobile Events Calendar MVP is rather simple; however, in the future, categories will come into play to help users improve the discovery experience. At the moment, this serves as one of the biggest constraints.
CALENDAR MVP USER FLOW
Once the IA and core features were defined, I created an end-to-end user flow for the MVP of the Reddit Events Calendar to ensure that the user experience is streamlined, clear and is free of dead ends. Feel free to click on the flow to enlarge!
The MVP User Flow
III. Ideation
Initial Sketches
Explorations
Initial SKETCHES
EXPLORATIONS
Discovery Unit Explorations
For the MVP, the primary entry point will be the user’s app tray. However, I also made designed future entry points — such as in-feed Discovery Units and the Subscriptions screen. These will be possible once the Events Calendar can be expanded to fall within individual communities and when events can be categorized.
Event Post Explorations
Considering the fact that event posts include extra metadata beyond the typical Reddit post — I explored design solutions for the best way to showcase each event post, which must include a “Follow” CTA as well as the time and data metadata.
Layout Explorations
IV. Validation
Design Critiques
CRITIQUES + ENGINEERING CONSTRAINTS
Throughout the three weeks of this project — we had three formal critiques with rooms packed full of Product Designers, PMs (even a Group PM) and Engineers. These discussions went back and forth, particularly about the IA and copy.
Also, apologizes but we weren’t allowed to take photos during our critiques as these were private meetings on new Reddit products.
In any case, given the many constraints regarding the novelty of this specific product and the limitations in timeline and engineering — our product team met regularly, working together cross-functionally to ensure that the designs could be shipped and were up to the standards of the PRD (and of course, Reddit).
V. Prototype
Hi-Fidelity Mocks MVP
Hi-Fidelity Version 2.0
Invision Prototyping
HI-FIDELITY MOCKS (MVP)
Main Calendar Screens
Additional Screens
HI-FIDELITY MOCKS (VERSION 2.0)
Version 2 of the Events Calendar will arrive once we have categories set up in place. There aren’t too many changes planned (as of yet); though, much of it is focused on additional entry points and an updated Discovery view.
New Entry Points — Discovery Units and Subscriptions Screen
The Future of the “Discovery” View
Using Principle, I played around with some animations to accompany the future product roadmap for the Events Calendar. We’re hoping the recent (or potentially “live”) comments and categories will drive users to take action and participate in Reddit Events.
INVISION PROTOTYPING
Per usual, if you would like to check out the prototype of the MVP — click on the button below!
VI. Delivery
Redlining + Handoff
REDLINING + HANDOFF
Once again — at Reddit, to ensure the most accurate handoff to designers, we redline our designs (almost quite literally) by hand.
