CompliMint: A Case Study/App Design Adventure (Part 1)

So a couple days ago, I was looking for some UX resources to get a little more practice under my belt. I came across DesignLab's "12 Days of UXmas" and it sounded not only fun and valuable, but also not too overwhelming (not to mention, free).

This blog post is a sort of introduction to the app I am designing as a part of this challenge. In it, I go through the initial thought process and app idea, as well as providing some mockups of what the app might look like. Mind you, I'm still early on in the challenge (like Day 3), so things are probably going to change as I go through the process of researching, designing, and testing. So bare with me. (:

The Challenge:

The prompt was to think of an app idea that centered around kindness and goodwill. It took me about 5 seconds before the idea popped into my head for CompliMint.

(note: I still haven't really decided on the name, but for the purpose of not saying 'the app' 500 times, I'm going with CompliMint for now.)

The Background:

One thing I've been trying to do more often is to tell the people in my life how much I appreciate them. In this day and age, digital interaction has cast a big, scary shadow over face-to-face communication, making it that much more awkward and intimidating to say something nice to someone in person, even if they love that person a lot.

With this whole concept being pretty top of mind for me, the first idea that came after reading the UXmas prompt was an app that encourages more frequent human-to-human appreciation, both digitally and organically.

There are three main function of the app: Sending CompliMints, Setting Reminders, and Your CompliMint Bank.

Sending CompliMints:

Through the sending of CompliMints, users can both brighten their loved-ones days and have theirs brightened as well. Users would have the option of adding a little built-in illustration, animation, photo or video to go with the message. A little like this:

Sweet and simple.

Now, you may be thinking, "Wait a minute, I thought this was all about getting back to face-to-face interactions". You're not wrong.

While the app would have the ability to send and receive digital messages, it would still be focused primarily on saying good things to someone's face. How?

Reminders:

This function would allow users to remind themselves to give a compliment to a certain someone at a later date.

For example, say I’m talking to my friend Jen about how my other friend John brought me some tea from Starbucks when I was feeling a little under the weather last week. Jen recounted another time that John had done something nice for her when her mother was ill. The thought occurs to me that, “Wow, John is such a selfless human. I’m really happy he’s my friend. I should tell him that”...

Buuuuut, John isn’t there and I’d feel kind of ‘meh’ saying it in a text. I decide I’ll tell him next time I see him.

If I remember.

So, I set a reminder in my CompliMint app to tell John how much I appreciate his selflessness and friendship. I can set the reminder to go of at a certain time or day, or even at the location where I know I will see him next.

And there you have it: A simple nudge in the direction of more sincere human-to-human interaction.

Your Compliment Bank:

The final little part of my app idea is the ability to not only receive, but also store the compliments you receive. Sometimes people tend to forget that they are loved and appreciated, and in these times, they should be reminded.

Your compliment bank consists of all of the compliments you've gotten (either through the app, or you can manually enter one someone gave you in person) to look back on when you're feeling down or unappreciated. You can set up a daily notification (whether it be in the morning when you first wake up or during that mid-afternoon slump) of one of the compliments in your bank to remind you that you're doing okay.

And just like that, your day has gotten a little brighter. From here, you can either keep on shining and dismiss the notification, or open the app to send a CompliMint, browse your bank, or set a reminder.

Wrap Up:

In short, this app will make it easier to tell others you appreciate them. It will improve self-love and self-esteem by reminding users they are appreciated. But overall, I think CompliMint will help us all to reconnect and grow together as humans in a digital world.

I'll check back in with updates when I get a little further into the project. But for now, I'm super excited to be designing an app that puts some good out there into the world.

Cheers,

- Liv