Impulse - The Dance Space
Impulse is an easy-to-use dance app that connects dance enthusiasts who want to learn a variety of dance styles from world-class choreographers.
Impulse is an easy-to-use dance app that connects dance enthusiasts who want to learn a variety of dance styles from world-class choreographers.
The Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown have disrupted many people's lives and made it very difficult for dancers to perform on stage or teach. Also for those who want to improve their dancing skills, there are currently few opportunities to learn dancing.
Impulse dance app aims to connect dance enthusiasts who want to learn a variety of styles from a world-class choreographer. Our goal is to provide an efficient way for users to learn dance through online master classes from their favorite choreographer and get in-person feedback via messaging and video.
Project for Career Foundry UX Design Bootcamp
End-to-end UX/UI Design
6 months (Jan 2022 - June 2022)
Figma | Optimal Sort | Usability Hub
I used a design thinking process with a user-centered approach, which is all about problem-solving. Based on this method, I have built up my case. It will guide you through different stages from research to the final product at the end.
When the pandemic hit, all the dance classes were shut and people started to explore different online platforms such as YouTube, and Instagram to learn dance but none of them were enjoyable or effective in helping people to develop their dancing techniques from home.
After conducting extensive research, I found that there were not enough dance learning apps out there, the existing handful of apps has lots of bugs. In addition to this, I found more problems in this arena. They are as follows:
No one common portal for dancers to meet and share the artform
No Flexibility to choose an Instructor
There is no way individual dance makers can earn money
Hard to find dance events/workshops that are happening around them
Impulse app is an easy-to-use dance app that encourages users to spend less time searching and more time dancing.
Based on the user's likes, the app algorithm is constantly improving to suggest master classes and dance videos that match the taste of the user. The App’s main goals are:
Learn dance from the world's best dance instructor
Clarify doubts or questions with the dance instructors
Watch video lessons, take live classes or download related music
Save your favorite classes & take them as many times as you like
Find dance events in your location and get the best deal on tickets
For a broader picture, I researched similar apps with a focus on online dancing and found the major competitors were CLI STUDIOS, STEEZY, JUST DANCE NOW, and SHAKE.
Interactivity - Users cannot ask direct questions to the instructor or provide feedback/make reviews of any individual instructor.
These apps only have popular dance forms such as Hip-Hop, Ballet, Jazz, etc. To gain more international audiences, it's necessary to include a variety of dance forms around the world, not just the popular ones.
No personalized experience.
Some apps were outdated and UI was slightly clunky to use.
To learn more about the needs of my users I conducted 4 user interviews and 1 survey. I created the survey on Google forms and distributed it with a known group of friends, and dance-related forums and got 27 responses.
Research Goal
User Interview - Findings
The data that I gathered during the user interviews were then sorted into clusters using affinity mapping.
Behavior - One common behavior among my participants was, that everyone, felt more confident & felt good about themselves while they danced.
Pain Points - Not enough guidance from dance teachers and many quoted that online sources for the dance style they wanted to learn were very less.
Experiences in learning from Online Platform: All participants were common about the YouTube experience didn't help them overall in terms of improvement as there was no one to tell if they are doing it right or wrong.
Expectations from a digital platform - The majority of them preferred to try different dance styles and also wanted the flexibility to choose a dance instructor.
Based on what I found about the behavior, needs, and goals of my interviewees and participants, I created 2 personas.
Based on the user personas, I have crafted user stories that explain how users will accomplish their goals in the Impulse app.
By mapping out user flows for Jasmine, I broke down their step-by-step processes to ensure every task needed to reach their ultimate goal was accounted for.
I structured a sitemap of how the pages are prioritized, linked, and labeled. To make it more intuitive for users, I conducted an online open card sort using OptimalSort where 10 participants grouped 20 cards into categories.
Changes I made based on user feedback including:
Simplified the structure by reducing categories
Recategorize cards based on high user agreement rate
Renamed sections to avoid confusion
There were several ideas to deliver our insights during the brainstorming session.
Before wireframing, I defined the essential features that would help our personas to achieve the goal. I started with brainstorming and proceeded to sketch out the task flows.
.jpg)
Using pen and paper for low-fidelity and Figma for mid-fidelity, I created a series of prototypes.
Using my low-fidelity prototypes for guidance, I translated my hand-drawn screens into digital mid-fidelity prototypes. This allowed me to get a better sense of how each of my screens would be perceived once implemented onto a digital device.
Before finalizing my high-fidelity prototypes, I needed to test my design decisions on real people to measure how easy and satisfying my designs were to use and to confirm that they contained the features and functionality users needed to complete the most important tasks.
Usability Test Plan Highlights:
I connected with 6 participants and conducted moderated remote, task-driven usability tests. I chose them based on their background, interest in dancing, and close match with my user personas
There were no "Usability Catastrophes" but my participants provided great suggestions on some functions that I hadn't even thought of for the future.
From the tests, I learned that very small errors can cause very big problems giving me a new appreciation of 'the devil is in the details.
to see the full usability test plan document:
Click here
After re-watching 6 hours of precious recordings from the testing sessions, I collated all the useful nuggets of insights from my users into a rainbow spreadsheet - consisting of observations, positive quotes, negative quotes, and errors.
Based on various feedback from 6 other peers + mentors feedback, I continually iterated my design over 1 week - with 3 major improvements:
The style guide below was created to depict the Impulse app's professional but friendly feeling. These are just a few aspects of the guide that I chose to highlight. check out The Full Style Guide for more details.
Check out the Full Style Guide here:
Click here
Users can browse videos from the home screen or the videos section after logging in to Impulse. The videos section will have a set of classes & programs. Individual videos will be under classes and groups of videos (For Example 10 videos from Intro to Ballet) will be under Programs.
Users can only chat/video call with Dance Instructor only after booking a call.
By default, the chat features will be disabled, forcing users to book a call in advance to chat or video calls them.
This feature makes life easier for both instructors and students by ensuring that they are safe and that their time is respected.
Users of Impulse don't have to rely on other apps to find dance-related events. They will be informed of the most recent and exciting dance events in their selected location. Impulse serves as a one-stop shop for dance fans, catering to all of their demands.
When purchasing tickets through the app, Impulse users receive special discounts. The app also allows users to save their credit card information and make easy & quick payments.
Any issues? users don't have to worry. Impulse has 24*7 customer support via chat, phone, or email
After polishing the UI screens, I finalized my prototype and feel content with the MVP.
View the final prototype here:
Click here
Any Key Learnings?
What could be improved on?
What new hypothesis do you have?
- Get to know your users through user research.
- It can be easy to start designing based on your own opinions. Make it a point to continuously refer back to your user personas and key findings from user research to keep the user at the center of your designs.
- Always get a fresh eye to review and test out your designs!
Iterations and improvements are always a part of UX and especially for this app, I believe the UI can still be improved. The other aspect I feel that can be improved is adding some minor features to improve usability and functionality.
Building an engaged community, because everyone who uses my app will have similar interests and feelings. As a result, I desired to create an active online dancing community that would make my users feel more connected.
%201.svg){kind=small}
