CHALLENGE AT HAND
How can we create a vibrant and creative forum that seamlessly combines networking, mentorship, and future opportunities into a unified experience?
MY ROLE
Product Thinking, UX Research, Design Strategy, Information Architecture, CRM
TIMELINE
January - April 2023
TEAM UAL - MEMBERS
OVERVIEW
Forum by ReGo is a pioneering platform designed to bring creators, artisans, mentors, and thought leaders into one vibrant community. Blending the best of networking, events, and collaboration tools, it empowers creatives to showcase their work, find gigs, and grow through meaningful connections. This project focused on reimagining a creative community in this digital world.
Amber, Deeptha, Kevin, Kiran
INDUSTRY PARTNERS
ReGo, The Future London, UAL
Tools
Figma, Miro, Notion, HubSpot, Monday.com
Our Team with Team ReGo during the final strategy meeting
This research framework guided our process in understanding how people, technology, and business intersect to create a sustainable, inclusive community for creatives.
Understanding Community
To design a community experience, we first had to unpack what “community” really means. We dove into secondary research to explore its core aspects, to understand where ReGo could make the biggest impact, and who the key players are in building one. Our process included desktop research, competitor analysis, and a PESTLE study, giving us a clear lens into the creative ecosystem we were designing for.
Desktop Research
Our research goal was to understand the elements of communities and how to foster a sense of belonging in a community. We examined the fundamental principles of community building, such as shared identity, personalised experiences, inclusive interactions, and emotional connections.
Competitive Analysis
To strengthen our ideas of what community platforms offer, we looked at several competitors. We identified several opportunities in the market to help creative community to help them feel belonged and demistify the industry.
PESTLE Analysis
PESTLE analysis to gain a comprehensive understanding of the external factors influencing ReGo Forum, identifying the diverse stakeholders, mapping their interests, influences, and relationships with the community.
Identifying the Problem
User Interviews to Building Persona
Our research revealed the core personas shaping the Forum ecosystem: Emerging Creatives, Artisans, Independent Freelancers, and Thought Leaders. Their voices defined our design direction.
Opportunities
From here on, we started identifying the opportunities to solve the problem.
The Birth of Forum by ReGo
To bring the creative community vision to life, we tested it in the real world with an event designed for creatives to meet, network, and collaborate and find thought leaders.
We built Forum by ReGo, a sub-brand which would bi-weekly events to achieve this. We created the complete with event branding, marketing, pre-event, event control and post event strategies.
Branding the Experience
We created its branding to give the event its own identity while staying true to ReGo’s values. From logo and color palette to typography and event collateral, the branding was crafted to feel bold, creative, and community-driven.
I created a Design System for the team to maintain consistency throughout our designs. The design language was to keep it simple, clean and bold and that we can use illustrations for visual storytelling as long as it depicts community and creativity. As a UX designer, I mde sure that the colour contrasts in both digital and phsyical assets.
Building the Buzz
#TakeItToTheStreets Campaign
To spark curiosity and grow anticipation, I strategised the #TakeItToTheStreets campaign. After a thorough research into the trends and ReGo's social media (Instagram for starters) profile data, my strategy focused on storytelling, visual intrigue, and grassroots engagement.
The result? A surge in reach with 80% higher impressions, engagement, and followers in just aweek.
Testing the Idea
Event Experience
We culminated a Forum by ReGo event, a real-world test of our idea. Creators, artisans, mentors, and thought leaders came together to meet, collaborate, and celebrate creativity. With strong branding and targeted campaigns, the event proved the power of community in action.
Challenges and Understanding
After the event, we went back to the drawing board, hit pause and asked: what worked, and what didn’t? The event sparked curiosity and connections, but we also saw gaps, from low turnout to missed chances for post-event networking. These observations became fuel for iteration, pushing us to reimagine how Forum could be iterated.
Customer Journey Maps
We used Customer Journey Mapping to understand touchpoints, pain points and opportunities for Forum by ReGo experience. Through this experience we were able to identify the best optimised solution for a Forum by ReGo experience.
Business Canvas Model
This versatile framework enabled us to systematically map out the essential components of the ReGo Forum, providing a holistic perspective on the tasks, resources, and requirements necessary for its successful execution.
How can we best solve this problem?
After testing our first event, we shifted focus to the digital space. We explored leading global platforms like ADP List, LinkedIn, and Bumble Professional tools widely used in London, to understand how they tackled collaboration and opportunities.
Mapping their core features against our vision, we uncovered clear gaps and refined our Jobs-to-be-Done, sharpening the foundation for Forum's next phase.
User Flows & Roles
After defining our main features, we defined the roles and responsibility for a better workflow and navigation of the app. We enabled and disabled features based on roles assumed and made "Mentorship" as a add-on instead of a role, which made the workflow much simpler.