Playpal App
What is PlayPal?
PlayPal is an app for parents and children to make new friends. Parents make a profile for their child, showing their age and interests, and the app matches them with other kids in their community. Parents can then look through the matches and send a message to the other child’s parent to arrange a playdate. You can also keep track of playdates on the app’s calendar. This app is great for parents who are new to an area or simply want to help their kids make friends and explore their hobbies. PlayPal puts safety first and everyone is verified before being matched with others.
The Problem
Currently, there are not many apps that target this demographic, and the bulk of scheduling falls on the parents, who are already juggling so much. Working parents find themselves juggling hundreds of daily tasks and messages about their childrens’ playdates get mixed in with everything else. Our goal is to simplify the process both by providing parents of young children with the chance to have their kids meet up with children they may not know well, and by providing a safe space to schedule meet-ups, that will also keep track and remind parents of their upcoming playdates.
Research - What We Know:
Our research revealed that:
- Children meet with their friends at least 1-2 times, weekly
- Despite the growing trend in paternal involvement, mothers remain the primary gatekeepers of the children’s schedules
- Playdates are scheduled in advance due to conflicting schedules
- Parents are not completely satisfied with how playdates are scheduled, but do not see an alternative
Personas
Shani Artzi
Shani is a 29-year-old High-Tech Project Manager and a married mother of two, residing in Tel Aviv. She leads a busy life but dreams of having a house constantly filled with kids.
Tammy Samuel
The 42-year-old teacher and mother of three lives in the suburbs. Tammy finds that her kids rarely have time to play with others because they have so many extracurricular activities.
Einav Katz
Einav is married with 3 children and a thriving career in Interior Design. She is overwhelmed with the number of chat groups she has to deal with all of her clients, kids school groups, etc.
User Flows
I developed a number of user flows to demonstrate the decision making that I imagined a user would have to deal with while using the system. This allowed me to minimize steps to achieve something as simple as scheduling a playdate.
Site Map
Low-Fidelity Wireframes
High-Fidelity Wireframes
Prototype
This project was conceived as part of my final project at the Technion’s UX Course.
Thank you for reading!