SNKRS App Redesign
The SNKRS app is currently a place for Nike to share news on the latest trends, announce upcoming releases, and where customers can buy their sneakers. Our goal was to also make it a place for the sneaker community to come together and share their love for sneakers.
Length of Time
Three Weeks
My Role
UX Researcher, Designer,
& Copywriter
Tools Used
Sketch Pad, Figma, Photoshop,
& lots of coffee!
Challenge
In addition to directives given to us in our design brief. We found a large portion of the sneaker community feels they have been "gentrified out" because of the resale market and the scarcity of the product itself.
This explains Nike's invested interest in creating a community and building trust back with their user base.
Objective
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Give users the ability to post, reply, and react to content.
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Provide verification on sneakers and tips for buying sneakers.
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Develop an area to showcase their interests and collection.
Research Goals
Because both the sneaker community and Nike have been established for a considerable time, there was a wealth of information for me to dive into. I decided I wanted to focus my areas of research on three main subjects.
Competitive Analysis
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What are their current competitors offering?
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Where is our target demographic meeting now?
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What options do they have to verify the legitimacy of their sneakers?
SNKRS Brand Audit
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How do current SNKRS users feel about the app?
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Current pain points about the SNKRS product?
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What are Nike's goals for SNKRS and its community?
Target Demographic
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Who considers themselves sneakerheads?
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What are their biggest pain points in trying to connect to their community?
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What are their social media preferences?
Insights
After what felt like several hundred articles and multiple cups of coffee later, we had a wealth of information to begin creating user surveys, SME interviews, and affinity maps. Here is a brief overview of what we found.
Opportunities for Improvment
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The SNKRS app's design itself is clean, minimalist, and aesthetically pleasing. However, the amount of content displayed on the home screen is overwhelming, and the inability to filter the content makes it difficult for the user to find specific material.
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The content provided is all from Nike and not the real users of the app. This left users feeling unheard and not catered to.
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After testing the home screen "feed" it was clear the content on the home screen was not curated to the user whatsoever. This leads many users to ignore the feed section all together.
Competitive Analysis
Main reselling competitor - GOAT app
The GOAT app is a place where you can share your style, grow your collection, and also has the ability to resell your shoes or buy shoes from resellers.
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Users enjoy the simplicity of its design and its robust search and filtering system.
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The ability to track content that inspires you but also allows you to track what you own.
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It also has a page dedicated to verifying the legitimacy of sneakers.
Main community competitor - Kicks on Fire App
Kicks on Fire app allows users to show their own style and collection to a community. You are able to like users' posts as well as resell shoes.
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Users enjoy connecting to their friends and others with the same interests.
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The liking features also give the user a sense of validation and pride in their unique style and intrests.
Nike SNKRS app's main competitor is the same as their biggest footwear competitor Adidas with the Adidas Confirmed app. Some of the biggest areas that the ​Confirmed app excels in are the ability to personalize content and the ability to save and collect content/products that you are interested in.
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However, the majority of the app's content and functionality is similar. Integrating a social aspect to the SNKRS app might help it differentiate itself from the Confirmed app.
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I also wanted to make sure we included apps where sneakers could be resold or products that helped in displaying your sneaker collection or verification. While this market was significantly smaller we were able to find some comparable products.
User Survey's and Interviews
Now that we had a good foundation of research to pull from, we created a user survey that we send out to various online forums. I also did some surveys in various sneaker stores. We also were able to speak to two SME's who had used the SNKRS app extensively.
INTERACTION IS KEY
76% of the sneakerheads we interviewed ranked community interactions as an important part of the culture.
60% of those use instagram as their preferred method of interacting with others.
CHECKING LEGITIMACY
Through our interviews, we found that most sneakerheads go through a self-evaluation. Since there is a risk with seeing shoes in to be evaluated many users don't trust this. They also don't find AI checkers to be reliable either.
USER AGE RANGE
Sneakerheads are a wide age range from 18-40 years old. The younger age group from 18-29 is newer sneakerheads who are interested in fashion and community. The older sneakerheads generally have a disposable income that lends itself to collecting.
CLOUT CHASING
Our survey results show a lot of users would use the social aspects to mostly show off their collection or style. They would still probably go to their reliable resources for advice and bigger discussions.
Personas
Below are the three personas we used to build user empathy and understanding. I always enjoy creating personas, so I took the lead on these. After synthesizing data from our surveys, interviews, and secondary research, they fell into three distinct categories.
Collectors
This group has some unique demographics tending to be slightly older. They are invested in growing their collections and the history behind the sneakers they collect.
I developed a persona based on this group because they:
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think the sneaker culture is to be protected.
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have knowledge they are willing to share with the community.
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have pride in displaying and sharing their collections.
Sneakerheads
Sneakerheads are the heart of the community. They are passionate about almost all aspects of the sneaker community. They are concerned with function as well as fashion.
I developed a persona based on this group because they:
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are the most social group.
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create communities of like - minded people.
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have pride in the sneaker culture.
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are invested in the hobby and culture.
Trend Hunters
This group is also known by other sneaker lovers as "hypebeasts."
They see sneakers as part of their
self-expression and personal fashion.
They have the pulse on the hot sneaker trends.
I developed a persona based on this group because they:
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follow trends in the community.
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are active in sharing their new finds.
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are an influential part of the community..
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bring sneaker culture to other groups.
With these personas, we pinpointed the core needs and frustrations of our user base. Discovered the main influences of our users and their preferred way of connecting to the community. We referred back to these personas during our iteration process and throughout our designs. With these representations of our main user base established, we moved to our ideation phase.
Designing and Prototyping
With a better understanding of our user base and we began to sketch and design the features and how we would implement them into the app.
Team Sketches
We ended up using a combination of our sketches to make our final designs. We were all inspired by Instagram and wanted our users to be familiar with the features we were adding. There were also features we were going to integrate into the home screen feed and other screens.
Wireframes
We decided that users could best show of their style and collection if they had a profile similar to most social media sites. Where they could create unique posts about all kinds of subject matter, a section to show their collection and also an area to highlight pieces of their outfits.
In order to start our high-fidelity designs, we made replicas of existing screens like the landing page shown here.
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In order to hit all of the new features that Nike was looking to add to the SNKRS app, we decided to make a profile page that follows a similar structure to social media apps like Tik Tok and Instagram.
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Another way we wanted to show individuality was through their post feed, you can tell a lot about a person's style and preference through the picture they choose to post.
User posts and comments
User Profile
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Content
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Collection
Closet
Project Reflection
What's Next
Following the first round of testing, the next steps would be to iterate on our feedback and then test to make sure we have resolved any and all issues brought to light.
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Re address commenting on features on Nike content and loading animation to be shorter.
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Conduct a second round of user testing in the field, to identify active usability issues.
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Prepare deliverables for development handoff.
Project Takeaways
I knew going into this project it would be the most challenging so far. Which features were the most important? How would they work with the existing features on the app? Given the diversity of problems that the sneaker community faces, what were some ways we could create a safe environment to share their hobby and own personal style? I found myself truly enjoying the process of discovering this new community and learning what makes them special and the challenges they face.
Some key takeaways are:
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Communication is key. To have an organized and cohesive design, you need good communication between team members. Keeping everyone on the same page is essential.
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Design is a fluid process. Being receptive to change and user feedback is essential.
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Create a well-organized project plan. With so many issues to consider, a good strategy will prioritize on what’s needed.
While our features cannot solve all of the needs of the sneaker community. I believe it is a good base to build a safe community and earn trust back from the users that have felt alienated form the SNKRS app. I