tapas
“Phone Eats First”
overview
Tapas is THE foodie a social media application. Often when looking for a new place to eat the options of where to check a place out are limited. Consumers must dig through Instagram to maybe find what they are looking for. I wanted to create an app that has all the elements of finding great restaurants and dishes easier. When looking for recommendations, sometimes my friends swear by a dish, but they don’t know what I like. I wanted a system to know what flavors other users like to know if I should try something they rated highly. There is a dire need for this application.
Role: Creator & UX Researcher
prototype
methods
The participants were given an initial interview to see if they matched the desired user demographics. Then the participants were then chosen based on their results, availability, and purposive sampling based on known knowledge and former observations. Prior to starting the study, the participants were explained the concept of the application as a social media app for foodies. Then they were asked an initial series of questions. Then the users were asked to interact with the application via screen share on zoom and voice their thoughts. After this user test, the participants were asked a concluding series of questions. The input and observations from the research heavily influenced the recommendations for future work.
The participants were chosen based on the following data. The target smartphone user, according to Statista, is 18-29 however due to covid-19 the sample was chosen with restrictions in mind. All the users frequent and are avid smartphone users and relative to their occupation all the participants spend a considerable amount of money at restaurants per month. Combined, these factors made them ideal candidates for this user test.
initial survey
Though Manny went out the most he only sometimes takes pictures of his food and does not use social media. However, this did not deter him from finding the app useful.
The users identified four competitors Snapchat, Instagram, Google, and Yelp. Three of which are not specifically geared towards food. Thus, proving the need for an application like tapas. All the users understood the name of the application.
To conclude this survey all the users said they would use this app.
post study survey
The users responded well to the colors however mellow does not hit the target. Angel specifically pointed out that they were not enticing so the app will incorporate the addition of vibrance and colors. The users liked the tokenization and all of them would unanimously use one of the options to login. However, Angel and Luna asked why Facebook was not an option and expressed that convivence was more important to them than issues of privacy. It will be important to comment on social media applications as it will promote the use of the application as 80% of the survey group would do so.
future work
Tapas should be developed and though the app looks great the next prototype would need significant improvements of features. In the future I would:
Further look into monetization of the app. This element would fund continuous research to continue to evolve with the user’s interactions and technological capabilities.
This would enable aggregation of consumers’ spending habits and allow it to personalize the feed of the user. A feature could then be marketed towards restaurants as an information service.
The color scheme though neutral in gender needs to be more enticing to the user.
The user should be able to filter by miles in their feed to see if any of the users they follow have
posted/ reviewed places near them.
A comments section would be added so the users can add descriptions to their reviews.
Foodie influencers could consult as leaders and verified flavor profiles on the app to provide branded reviews for users.
- The app needs to be connected to other social media platforms to promote the use and maximize satisfying results