
AYUSHA MEHROTRA
UX / UI Designer & Strategist




Project Timeline
10 weeks
My Role
Design Strategist,
UX Designer
Tools
Figma, Keynote
InDesign, Imovies,
Miro.
Team
Sidhant Chopra & Ayusha Mehrotra,
Qi Li
Identifying The Problem
The Problem
The event industry is rapidly changing with the ongoing health crisis. According to event marketers, 7 out of 10 respondents have moved their face-to-face events partially or fully to a virtual platform. Without human interaction and the energy it creates, the celebration can often be difficult to achieve. The feeling of disconnect persists and often the essence of the celebratory cause does not come through, when celebrated virtually.

"How might we create personalized celebratory experiences for young adults in the virtual world?"


Market Analysis
Mind Map
We brainstormed together and developed a
mindmap to identify the different aspects of the term "CELEBRATION."

2X2 Matrix
We identified direct and secondary rivals in the celebration industry, specifically looking at the virtual celebration space.
Our sweet spot:
We want to develop a solution that would be unique and add high value to the users. This would help in enhancing their celebrations in a fun manner while being in a virtual setting.

Porter's Five Forces
As the pandemic has hit the travel and event industry really hard, but this has not stopped people from taking part in their intimate celebratory causes. Due to this, the demand for alternative methods is high, but available solutions low, leading to a high supplier power but low buyer power. There is a high threat of new entrants as there is a lack of unique solutions available in the market, leading to a low threat of substitutes.

Defining Network Users
We developed a stakeholder map to identify our target audience and recruit people for personal interviews.
Primary Stakeholders : Hosts, Celebrants, Guests
Secondary Stakeholders:
Event Managers, Service providers
Tertiary Stakeholders
Vendors

User Groups

Survey
We conducted a survey to collect quantitative data for our topic. We got 56 responses. On the right, is an infographic that summarizes the data concisely.


We conducted 15 personal interviews. Below are a few important insights from the interviews.


After synthesizing the collected data, we created empathy maps for each user group and developed 8 personas to better understand the problem.



Key Insights
1
Zoom has been instrumental in connecting people during this time but people are getting bored of it and are looking for creative ways of spending time virtually.
2
People are willing to spend money if they get the options to customize their experience.
3
Current avenues of virtual celebrations can get awkward and chaotic if not managed properly.
4
People feel that virtual celebrations will only last till we get a vaccine for Covid, after which everything will be back to on-ground celebrations.
Value Proposition Canvas
FOR
WHO
OUR
WE DO THIS BY
UNLIKE OTHERS
OUR
Young adults i.e. GenZ and young millennials.
Want to find alternative ways of celebrating important events of their lives
Product/service will ease the process of planning and hosting virtual celebrations and also provide interactive activities for people to do while celebrating
Creating a holistic solution to celebrations virtually and help people create interactive and fun filled celebrations
Platforms that lack interactive activities, are not secure and trustworthy and feel like a work video call due to lack of “fun” essence to them.
Approach is to make a product/service that can give the option to customization and add the element of personalization, making it more intimate
Competitor Analysis
We decided to test out the available applications/solutions available for virtual partying. We critiqued the applications based on functionality, engagement & fun. After this, we found our niche and mapped our strategy.



Strategy Mapping




Concept Generation

We used Miro as a collaborative tool for
our team. The Five E's matrix was used to generate ideas for our concept.
Business Model Canvas

1
3
5
End to end
service
2
Discovery
platform
4
Hyper
Personalization
Link between consumers & talent
One stop
platform for all your party needs
Highest Value Features
We prioritized the highest value adding features and decided to include this in our solution.
Why?
Promote the essence of being together, even if you're physically distant.
How?
We provide an alternate platform for individuals to connect with each other by erasing the physical boundaries and celebrate life’s important events together.
What?
We are a platform for individuals to plan virtual parties, in association with zoom. We provide unique and fun activities and private entertainment for these virtual parties.
Our Golden Circle
We answered the three questions of the golden circle to develop a clear strategy
for our solution.

Prototyping & User Testing
User Scenarios
We created user scenarios for each phase of the application to better understand the flow of the application.
Information Architecture

Low Fidelity Prototype











We set up Miro boards with the low fidelity prototype & took feedback from 10 users.

User Feedback
Scenario 1
• Too many quizzes
• Onboarding process is too long
• Back buttons missing
• Too complicated screens
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Scenario 2
• Free trial version for new users
• Address section: This is a bit tedious and confusing.
• Love that you have put into consideration the fact that so many artists are now struggling with the pandemic, great addition!
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Scenario 3
• Show answer list, with everyone's answer
• Since this is a zoom plugin, I'm wondering if this entails asking your participants to download something alongside the invite?
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Brand Development

Final Prototype

Easy Onboarding

Choose the Occasion

Take a simple quiz





Personalize your party experience



Choose our premium subscription to curate and deliver personalized boxes & book local talent.



We created gift packages for one of our personas - Alexys. While presenting the concept on Zoom, we delivered these gift boxes to three of our peers at their respective houses. These gift boxes were hyper personalized based on a theme "All that Glitters" which our persona decided after using our app "PARTYNATION".


Contents of the box
• Physical invite
• QR code for cool E-invite with the zoom link
• Party cocktail recipe
• Party swag
• Shot glasses
• Essense of an actual party
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Scan the QR code
Final App Prototype
This final app simulation. All changes were made after the user feedback. The prototype was created using Figma.
What I learned
Power of Team Collaboration
The research findings must be shared and discussed as a team in order to keep your team connected and engaged throughout the process. Bouncing ideas off each other is an effective way to reach the desired outcome. When reaching any team decisions, the users and their pain areas must be recognized.
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Feedback is Important
Design Process is iterative and taking feedback from the users can improve the end result. Sometimes the focus might shift and feedback helps in developing a realignment strategy.
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Next Steps
Future of Partynation
Further brainstorming needs to be done to make Partynation thrive post pandemic. Verticals that support local businesses & gig artists, needs to be explored further. The concept of party boxes/gift hampers can be also explored in the coporate setting.
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