Role
Product Designer
Team
1 Product Lead
6 Product Designers
Timeline
3 months
Skills
App Development, Branding, User Research, Interactive Design
During the creation process, we wanted to maintain a professional newspaper presence while prioritizing engagement and accessibility.
Research
User Interviews
In collaboration with the course ENGN 1931: Digital Nudges, we surveyed students on what they would most want to see from the BDH app.
We found that they wanted:
Brown-specific cultural content
Interactive features (Games, moving icons, advice columns…)
Customized content
App User Flow
Design Decisions
Onboarding - We wanted to make logging in as seamless as possible by using Google sign-in. This is followed with a preference section that allows for personalization and a sense of investment, as customization makes it more likely for users to return.
Home feed - We set up the home feed to lead with top stories followed by section based content.
Article page - To minimize distractions we put the author, timestamp, and section tag visible at a glance. The save button is kept in the header so users can easily save and return to reading.
Final Prototype
Reflection
Building the BDH's app from scratch taught me the importance of organization, communication, and support. It's important to not only do your task but to look for where you can give and get guidance from others. I learned so much from our Project Lead Hadley and everyone else. Next semester I plan on creating an iPhone widget, a curated content page, and a most popular articles page.