Third Wheel
Billy & Megan Mzenga are a married couple with a lot of single friends. They watched some of their friends struggle to find a suitable date, and could see the stress and frustration they had with the process. So they had a thought: “What if there was a way we could help our friends find a partner and take that pressure off of them?”, which led to the conception of the idea for Third Wheel.
As part of a team of UX Designers & Researchers, I assisted the team in conducted conceptual research and usability testing, helped create a design system, and design the user flow for for Third Wheel and help Billy and Megan present their idea as an alternative to modern dating apps.
CLIENT
Billy & Megan Mzenga
Competitive Audit & Analysis | Directed Storytelling | User Journey Mapping | Break-Up Letters | Design Systems & Component Libraries | Style Guides | Annotated Wireframes | High-fidelity Interactive Prototyping | Preliminary Branding & Logo Design
METHODS
Key Deliverables
UX Designer
The Third Wheel Team
Jonah Wang
UX Designer
UX Designer
Stress & Burnout
People are looking for serious relationships on dating apps, but lack of genuine interactions has people feeling emotionally and mentally drained.
Problems
Swipe Culture
Mismatched
In a sea of profiles and monetization schemes, users often feel that they are not being shown accurate matches based on their interests and values.
UX Researcher
Research
Another important aspect of our research process was conducting directed storytelling interviews to gain insight on what specific pain points people were experiencing on dating apps. Our client was gracious enough to share some preliminary research he had conducted so we reviewed his work and synthesized it as secondary research for context.
No Genuine Feeling
Even when people do manage to find matches, they often get ghosted, or their interactions on dating apps feel very insincere.
During the initial design phase, my teammates and I began by prototyping out core features at low-to-mid fidelity to propose solutions to the problems our research had posed. We furthered this by establishing the flow and list of screens that were essential to either single users or crews on the app, which focused on the design and interactivity of the profiles, ability to discuss and comment amongst crew members, and integrations to encourage real conversations and interactions both on and off the Third Wheel app.
The first point in our process was to compare and analyze features, mental models and design elements from popular dating apps. Although one of the main goals of Third Wheel is to differentiate from other dating apps, it was important that our design concept focus on breaking the conventions of the culture rather than the visual design.
Competitive Analysis
Directed Storytelling
Journey Mapping
Third Wheel is conceptually very different compared to other dating apps.
The single users who are technically the center of the app, have very minimal interaction with the Third Wheel app until their crew sends them matches, at which point it would align with more traditional apps. This is by intention, but also meant that we had to conceptualize the user experiences of both the single users as well as the crew members.
Shortly after synthesizing our research and creating our mid-fidelity prototypes, we conducted another round of evaluations; now that we had more context and features built, it would be easier for users to visualize the concept, which they seemed to struggle slightly with before. I moderated two of the tests, and helped guide them through the experience, while trying not to color their genuine impressions.
Documentation & Delivery
Interactive Prototype
Turning Problems into Features
Solutions
Design Goals
Concept & Usability Testing
In order to document the key flows, research findings, and future-state recommendations and in preparation for our client handoff, we created a findings and research report deck, annotated wireframes, and detailed user journey maps and information architecture diagrams.
Documentation
Delivery
We delivered a 15-minute presentation detailing our project to a general audience, conducted a client handoff meeting, and created a digital assets package which we delivered to the client to provide them the framework and tools to continue building upon the work our team did on Third Wheel.
ROLE
UX/UI Designer | UX Researcher | Participant Interview & Testing Moderator
Conclusion
Key Findings & User Impressions
Next Steps
Deliverables
8 out of 8 users expressed interest in the concept of Third Wheel
Users found the design and branding of Third Wheel to be “simple” and “intuitive”
The most popular feature by far was the CupidGPT and AI integration aspects
Users commented on how starting the conversation and finding a suitable first date were the often most difficult and painful parts of using dating apps for them, and regarded this as something they would find extremely helpful
Designing the flow for Crew members to start the crew and invite their friends that they want to matchmake for
Conceptualizing an alternative to a number based rating system on profiles
Although it is simple and easily understood by users, there are still some connotations to using numbers to rate people
Adding additional gamification angles to Third Wheel
Users seemed to gravitate towards these ideas, and it would help Third Wheel apart from other apps
Stress & Burnout
People are looking for serious relationships on dating apps, but lack of genuine interactions has people feeling emotionally and mentally drained.
Mismatched
In a sea of profiles and monetization schemes, users often feel that they are not being shown accurate matches based on their interests and values.
No Genuine Feeling
Even when people do manage to find matches, they often get ghosted, or their interactions on dating apps feel very insincere.
Billy and Megan Mzenga are work to create an experience that fosters genuine relationships and connections, something that many feel dating apps often fall short of. Third Wheel would be a solution to this problem for people more established in their lives that are looking for a serious relationship. Billy and Megan enlisted our UX team to design an experience which can help break the conventions of modern dating, while still being simple and clear.