Overview
Problem
Has this ever happened to you?
For my Master’s Thesis at Northwestern I was interested in exploring how we consume content together. I ended up creating the book club of the future.
User Interviews
I interviewed 13 users to get a better understanding of unmet needs. I spoke with a CEO, a TikTok influencer, a Bible study class, and several avid readers and podcast listeners.
Competitive analysis
I assessed platforms where users share reading and podcast content across several domains. I found that many were missing important ingredients in successfully generating meaningful conversations amongst close friends.
Insights
The definition of reading is expanding to include audio
People prefer having deep conversations with friends vs. online strangers
It’s hard to record and share in-the-moment reactions to content
How might we use long-form content to jumpstart meaningful conversations between friends in a way that feels effortless?
v1
User testing phase 1
User feedback indicated great interest in the One Cool Thing, Pin It, and Network features, while shrinking from the Echo and Friend Oath features. So I decided to focus on the three frontrunners and turning those into digital prototypes.
v2
User testing phase 2
In the next round of user testing, I learned that in addition to saving reactions “in the moment”, users also wanted to be able to share their reaction at the end of a podcast and highlight different features. So I made that.
Mood board + style guide
I wanted the design evoke a sense of playfulness and approachability through bright, contrasting colors and lines with thick stroke and shadow. For font, I thought a hand-drawn style for title text would complement the theme of whimsy.
Solution
“Serving savory conversations with the people you love”
Load content, capture reaction
Budder lets you access your favorite books and podcasts in one app.
While you’re consuming content, Budder lets you easily extract a piece of text or audio, record your reaction to it, and share it with a friend.
Voice Command
Book integration
Budder works just as well for e-books.
And even works for physical books by leveraging live text technology.
A “Toast”!
Budder seamlessly combines the content you share and your reaction into a Toast.
A Toast in action
Social reading
The resulting Toast helps jumpstart fun and meaningful conversations with friends.
Budder keeps track of your conversations through Potluck. Potluck gives you a visual, birds-eye view of your social reading network.
Which conversation do you want to be a part of?
Testimonials
Business model
Budder operates on a freemium model, meaning that paid subscribers get extra benefits. With the Pro version of Budder, you can add more friends and you can also see what the friends of your friends are reading and how similar your content is to theirs.
See how Budder compares
Budder does what none of the competition are even considering.
In that sense, Budder hits a target no one else even sees.
What I learned
Passion projects are super thrilling, absolutely draining, and in the long-term, rewarding.
Don’t equate a project, even a passion project, with your worth. There are more important things.
Don’t use research as an excuse to avoid starting the first iteration. Use the first draft as a springboard for asking people questions.
Keeping quotes organized and tagged is a good idea.
It helps to be able to draw well. Drawing is a method of thinking in pictures.
Pivots are OK, but make sure your expectations pivot responsively.
Don’t make components in Figma before you need to.
Unrealistic expectation: learning several new softwares for a project while working on that project.
Storytelling always matters more than you think it does.
Set aside time for presentation-crafting. Iterate the way you tell the story the same way you test a product—go through many versions and collect feedback.
If I had more time, I would have tested the final prototype with more users, especially podcast listeners. I would have created a living, clickable Toast for users to more accurately convey the idea I had in my head. I would code this app into a real thing and get all my friends hooked on it and wean them off of TikTok.