SEGD15 conference guide

In 2015 I was part of a group of volunteers that hosted the SEGD national conference. My focus was the visual identity, and as a side project I designed and built a digital guide for attendees.

My role: user research, user experience design, visual design, development

User research

I started by interviewing people about their experience at professional conferences to gauge the need and potential adoption of a product like this. These conversations provided valuable insight into my audience’s mindset, pain points, and priorities.

Strategy: native or web?

Reducing friction was a topic that came up repeatedly. Because conferences can be chaotic environments with congested networks, attendees were unlikely to search for and download a native app. They also mentioned temporary value–they’re unlikely to install a native app that doesn’t provide long-term benefits. To address these pain points, I decided to build a lightweight web app at a short, memorable url.

Sketches and wireframes

The guide set out to solve a small set of attendees’ problems, and do so with a fast, intuitive interface. These focused goals influenced the user experience and content architecture.

Prototyping

The early prototypes were made with Marvel and tested with design professionals. As I collected feedback and the prototypes became more sophisticated, they were made with HTML and CSS, which became the foundation for the final product.

Final product

The major success of the mobile guide was that it was humble. It didn't intimidate users by trying to do everything, it satisfied them by doing a few important things well.

The guide was announced at the conference's kick-off event, and saw modest but promising adoption. I got this anecdotal feedback from an attendee who didn't know I was responsible for the mobile guide: "This is great, I'm surprised they were able to pull it off."

More work

✌🏻