Flat Finder Case Study
Briefing
The objective of this project was to design a modern, fun, apartment finder tool geared mainly towards zoomers and millennials. To start out, I analyzed a dozen companies in this space and pulled out details I liked or didn’t like from them. [Note: early on my brandname was CrashPad which changed due to user feedback.] From there I built out a primary user flow to get started:
Low-fidelity wireframes
From here I started to sketch out some paper screens of the above flow to quickly devise a blueprint and catch any problems at an early stage which make any iterations quick and easy.
Creating the style guide
From here I started designing my mid-high fidelity wires with some icons, buttons, dummy copy and created a style guide after creating the home page to help the rest of the designs go faster and also maintain consistency. Check out my final version of the style guide below:
Although it’s not a full website design, this takes the user through several key pages from the home page to search to product details and even scheduling an appointment.
Feedback and iterations
Some feedback I received was the hero image looks nice but doesn’t make an emotional connection. Also, there’s a Christmas tree in the mirror and it’s July. And folks did not love my original name of “Crash Pad” because it’s not a familiar slang term in Massachusetts and the word “crash” invokes a negative connotation. And lastly, users thought the map on the search results screen was cramped and too small. It didn’t show enough info.
Prototype link:
Feel free to reach out to me for a live prototype link. Since the prototype can become buggy due to updates over time, I don't keep the link here anymore.
In hindsight and potential future steps:
Looking back on this assignment I do think it comes across as modern, trendy and professional and lives up to it’s competition in many ways. However, I think it needs to differentiate and build a competitive advantage to truly disrupt the digital apartment finder market. And ideally it would be even more in tune with what zoomers and millennials are truly looking for in an apartment.
Feel free to see more of my work with the link below or feel free to reach out to me for an interview!
Cheers!
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