Young adults often struggle to find accurate and up-to-date information about local events and promotions. Coordinating with friends and meeting new people while out adds to the challenge. Currently, no application allows users to discover, plan, and meet up all on the same platform. Our mission is to create a next-generation social media platform that encourages face-to-face interaction between users—both friends and strangers—in specific locations.
The app will provide information about events, activities, and deals in their area, serving the consumer in multiple ways:
Back to Hive
Addressing the Gaps in Social Event Planning and Discovery
Rippl, the Hyperlocal Social Platform
Overview
Promotional Content
Allow them to view and use promotions, deals, and coupons pushed by brands and vendors based off of their location.
Experience Planning
Allow them to browse events, venues, and activities in their area so they can plan their desired experience ahead of time, or they can figure out what’s next while on the go. They can also view and interact with their friends’ activities and events to determine what experiences they would like to attend.
Meeting New People
Allow them to meet new people who are nearby by viewing user profiles and facilitating a chat-based conversation consented to by both parties.
Friend Tracking
Allow them to see where their friends are on a map, even when they are not nearby, so they can choose where to go and meet up.
We will helps brands/vendors by providing them with a platform to draw in consumers at a hyperlocal level.
The application will serve the brand/vendor in two ways:
The application will serve the brand/vendor in two ways:
Hyperlocal Promotions
Allow them to send promotional content to people as they walk by and consumers in the immediate area to draw in more young adult attendees.
Staffing and Inventory
Allow them to make more accurate staffing and inventory estimations based off of redeemed promotions, user activity, people in the area, and other local events that may impact their business.
Business Goals
Short Term: The initial business goal is to create and grow a strong base of active consumer users and brand/vendor users in the Tampa Bay area and eventually other markets, in order to generate revenue by taking a percent of the revenue brought to vendors and brands.
2022: Echo plans to expand to a ticketing and payment system.
Long Term: Echo aims to be the first social media app specifically made for a post-cell phone world, through the use of AR/VR platforms.
2022: Echo plans to expand to a ticketing and payment system.
Long Term: Echo aims to be the first social media app specifically made for a post-cell phone world, through the use of AR/VR platforms.
AUDIENCE & USER TYPES
The target audience of the app consists of the following:
- MVP: Gen-Z Adults (18 - 24)
- Eventually: Millennials
- Vendors and Brands
The app will ultimately have three user types:
- Consumers
- Vendors and Brands
- System Administrators
TARGET AUDIENCE DETAILS
Where do they live?
The product will initially target consumers and brands/vendors in the Tampa Bay area.
Consumers
Consumers will want to use the application daily or even multiple times throughout the day. When they are not at leisure activities and events, they will still use the app to make plans for the upcoming night or weekend and see what their friends are planning to attend by viewing and interacting with their friends’ activity feeds and browsing local experiences. Users will have an advantage over non-users when it comes to finding what to do. The app will be used most frequently on nights and weekends, when people are out and looking for what to do and who to meet.
Vendors and Brands
The application will serve as a daily touchpoint for vendors and brands who are trying to gauge staffing needs and market to users to attract young patrons. During nights and weekends, vendors and brands will use the application to push last minute promotions to people in the area to sell tickets and draw in customers. They will have a competitive advantage over vendors and brands who do not
have access to Rippl users.
have access to Rippl users.
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS
Direct Competitors
UNight
Allows users to discover and follow deals, venues, events, and people, which will then show up in their activity feed. Users can see which of their friends are going out to which bars or events that night, and can invite friends to come out with them. Vendors are able to market to bar-goers in their area and see relevant real time data.
Indirect Competitors
Facebook Events
Allows users to create event pages and attach relevant information, choose privacy settings for the event, invite individuals and groups, advertise the event by sharing it through different avenues on Facebook, and add informations and posts to the page to excite the invitees and provide extra information. Invited parties can also RSVP for anyone on the page to see.
Snapchat Maps
Allows users to browse a map that shows their friends locations and heat maps of publicly posted videos. In a list view, the user can see recent activities of friends travels and how long ago they occurred.
Groupon
Allows users to browse virtual coupons (for both goods and services) that partnered companies are offering, view featured “Deals of the Day”, filter coupons by category, and receive notifications about nearby deals.
Hooked
Targets college towns and allows users to discover restaurants, bars, and food and drink deals from partnered companies in their area. Users can browse locations through a map or list view.
PAIN POINTS & SOLUTIONS
To gain deeper insights into the frustrations and challenges our users experience with attending and planning social events, we conducted comprehensive interviews and surveys. This allowed us to identify the most critical pain points. Following this, we held a dedicated ideation session to brainstorm and develop potential solutions to effectively address these issues.
Consumer Pain Points
"I don’t know what’s going on in my local area."
Solution
Vendors and brands can create and promote events, specials, promotions, etc. These will| be surfaced to consumer users when they search or browse an area or are physically in an area.
"I don’t know what venues near me are offering promotions."
Solution
Vendors and brands can create promotions that can be pushed to users in a certain location or discovered by users when they are planning their experience planning.
"I struggle meeting new people when I’m out."
Solution
Users are able to view a list of people that are around them when they are out. They can view a public profile and “wave” to another user. If that wave is returned, a chat will open. Users can determine their visibility to strangers and other users can be blocked and report users.
"I don’t know where my friends are hanging out or when they’re showing up."
Solution
Users can view the locations of friends in their area. They can also see who (friends and other users) has RSVP’d to upcoming events.
"It’s difficult to get my friends together for an outing."
Solution
Users can create an event and invite both users and non-users. Non-users get a single-thread SMS message with event info and a link to download the app. Responding to the SMS will push the RSVP back to the app.
Vendor & Brand Pain Points
"40% of my event tickets go unsold."
Solution
Increase the proportion of young adult attendees by showing them events, enabling them to share the events with friends, allowing them to browse promotions, and filling seats last minute by pushing out promotions to people in the immediate area.
"I don’t always know when there will be marketing opportunity or a major rush due to an event or gathering in my area."
Solution
Vendors/brands can see relevant information relating to redeemed promotions, user activity, people in the area, and other local events that may impact their business, allowing them to make more accurate staffing and inventory predictions.
"I can’t specifically target people who are near my location to increase walk-in traffic."
Solution
Brands/vendors can push out promotions to people in the immediate vicinity to bring in consumers passing by and people at other venues in the area who are looking for what to do next.
"I have to push my content out to multiple platforms."
Solution
By creating a strong consumer user base on Echo, it will become a central tool.
MVP FEATURE EPICS
Epics are major groups of features used for roadmap planning and are made up of multiple user stories. Based on the MVP features defined during the definition sprint workshop, we have identified nine major feature epics:
User account creation and profile
Finding friends and attracting new users
Map
Echo Admin Web App
Brand/Vendor Web App
Events, venues, and promotions
Meeting new people
Friends activity
Messaging
user stories
Epic 1 : User account creation and profile
As a new consumer user, I can create an account.
As a new consumer user, I have to fill out basic profile information when creating my account.
As a consumer or brand/vendor user, I can log into my account.
As a consumer or brand/vendor user, I can log out of my account.
As a consumer or brand/vendor user, I can reset my password.
As a consumer user, I can view and edit my profile information after I have created my account.
As a new consumer user, I have to fill out basic profile information when creating my account.
As a consumer or brand/vendor user, I can log into my account.
As a consumer or brand/vendor user, I can log out of my account.
As a consumer or brand/vendor user, I can reset my password.
As a consumer user, I can view and edit my profile information after I have created my account.
EPIC 2: Finding friends and attracting new users
As a consumer user, I can import my contact list into the app, so that I can find friends who are also using the app.
As a consumer user, I can send friend requests to people in my contact list that are using the app, so that I can grow my network.
As a consumer user, I can invite non-users to use the app.
As a consumer user, I can view outstanding invites.
As a consumer user, I can cancel or resend an outstanding invite.
As a consumer user, I can send friend requests to people that I search for by username.
As a consumer user, I can send friend requests to people in my contact list that are using the app, so that I can grow my network.
As a consumer user, I can invite non-users to use the app.
As a consumer user, I can view outstanding invites.
As a consumer user, I can cancel or resend an outstanding invite.
As a consumer user, I can send friend requests to people that I search for by username.
EPIC 3: Map
As a consumer user, I can view a list of friends and see their location on a map, even when they’re not near me.
As a consumer user, I can choose to show or hide my location to friends.
As a consumer user, I can view my friends profiles from the map
As a consumer user, I can see the location of events and venues near me on a map.
As a consumer user, I can choose to show or hide my location to friends.
As a consumer user, I can view my friends profiles from the map
As a consumer user, I can see the location of events and venues near me on a map.
EPIC 4: Meeting new people
As a consumer user, I can view a list of non-friend users near me
As a consumer user, I can virtually wave to non-
friend users near me. If that user waves back, I can initiate a chat-based conversation
As a consumer user, I can block other users from ever seeing my location
As a consumer user, I can choose to show or hide my location to non-friends
As a consumer user, I can virtually wave to non-
friend users near me. If that user waves back, I can initiate a chat-based conversation
As a consumer user, I can block other users from ever seeing my location
As a consumer user, I can choose to show or hide my location to non-friends
EPIC 5 & 6: Rippl Admin (WebApp)
As an admin user, I can create an account for a vendor/brand/venue.
As an admin user, I can log into my account. (Logout happens when the app is closed.)
As an admin user, I can view a list of users who have been reported as inappropriate.
As an admin user, I can delete accounts, including those that have been deemed inappropriate.
As an admin user, I can see metrics related to promotions saved, promotions redeemed, number of people attending an event, etc.
As an admin user, I can log into my account. (Logout happens when the app is closed.)
As an admin user, I can view a list of users who have been reported as inappropriate.
As an admin user, I can delete accounts, including those that have been deemed inappropriate.
As an admin user, I can see metrics related to promotions saved, promotions redeemed, number of people attending an event, etc.
EPIC 7: Events, venues, and promotions
As a consumer user, I can see the location of events and venues near me on a map.
As a consumer user, I can view a list of upcoming events.
As a consumer user, I can browse venues.
As a consumer user, I can browse promotions.
As a consumer user, I can view a venue or event profile.
As a consumer user, I can create a private event and invite up to 50 friends to it.
As a consumer user, I can view a list of upcoming events.
As a consumer user, I can browse venues.
As a consumer user, I can browse promotions.
As a consumer user, I can view a venue or event profile.
As a consumer user, I can create a private event and invite up to 50 friends to it.
EPIC 8: Friend activity
As a consumer user, I can view the activity (what events they have been invited to and accepted) of my friends in the app, even if they’re not near me.
As a consumer user, I can favorite an item in the friend activity feed.
As a consumer user, I can block other users from ever seeing my location.
As a consumer user, I can favorite an item in the friend activity feed.
As a consumer user, I can block other users from ever seeing my location.
EPIC 9: Messaging
As a consumer user, I can start a comment thread with a friend based on an item in the friend activity feed.
As a consumer user, I can see a log of all my group chats and individual chats.
As a consumer user, I can share an item from the activity feed, events list, or promotions list to a messaging thread with other consumer users.
As a consumer user, I can choose how waves and messages are handled.
As a consumer user, I can share events, venues, and promotions (can only be redeemed if an account is downloaded) with non-users in a view-only mode that promotes downloading the app. (SMS)
As a consumer user, I can see a log of all my group chats and individual chats.
As a consumer user, I can share an item from the activity feed, events list, or promotions list to a messaging thread with other consumer users.
As a consumer user, I can choose how waves and messages are handled.
As a consumer user, I can share events, venues, and promotions (can only be redeemed if an account is downloaded) with non-users in a view-only mode that promotes downloading the app. (SMS)
TECH STACK DETAILS
Backend - Heroku cloud service
- Ruby on Rails application framework
- Postgres database
- GraphOL API|
- Google Maps location services
- Firebase notifications, links
Frontend
- Android native front end
- iOS native front end
- React Vendor/Brand web app
