This week my task is to integrate a new feature into an existing app. This feature is a wish from an existing user called Ivona.
She has been using the app approximately since 2016. Although this is not the only app she uses for instant messaging, she is increasingly growing fond of it due to her friends influence.
Telegram is a free instant messaging software born in 2013. It’s main feature is the end-to end-encrypted video calling service and secret chats. This app has rapidly grown in popularity, with “about 500 million” monthly active users.
Ivona’s wish is to include a Birthday reminder as one of Telegram’s features, specifying that only day and month should be shown, not the year (Example: DD/MM). Since she has stopped using Facebook she misses this feature and has been forgetting to congratulate her friends and family. Talking to Ivona she explained how she would like to get notified by the app, and would like to see a birthday highlight in her Telegram contact list, although she would not like this to be too prominent as she is only interested in congratulating her closest ones.
Ivona is not the only one migrating to messenger apps that are known to be more respectful of its users’ data. Since the last WhatsApp Privacy Setting update in mid January, this has been a topic of conversation. Although this doesn’t necessarily mean that the general user has stopped using Whatsapp, we can see a preoccupation with what we want to share as individuals.
Competitor Analysis
The main competitors of Telegram are other instant messaging apps such as WhatsApp, Facebook messengers and Signal. After the interviews we are able to say that the main attributes our users value are usability, privacy and aesthetics.
Guerrilla Research
After casually Interviewing 5 Telegram users we have learned that a Birthday Notification feature, although not necessary, would be a welcomed feature as they mainly use this app to talk to their close ones. As we know from the interviews and the general trend our main users are concerned about data policies and trust Telegram to be a better choice than Whatsapp and Facebook.
This is not the only appeal of the app, its simplicity and intuitive usage together with functionality are key features that the user appreciates during the interview. Other features that allow the user to delete messages without leaving a trace or reading an ambiguous status such as ‘last seen recently’ instead of showing the exact time the person was online seems to also be a highlight.
“I love that you can customise everything in the operative system, how personal and simple it is and safety is also a big factor.”
More specific to Ivona’s wish, the interviewees will also like to see their contacts’ birthdays, mainly their closest ones but in general everybody in their connect list as this gives a chance to reconnect and keep in touch they would not necessarily talk to often.
The main outcome of the interviews could be that the general user is not willing to do this for all their contacts, as a result the Birthday feature should be integrated from the moment the user registers, so they can set up all their preferences about it from the beginning.
Although we might not always be willing to congratulate others on their birthdays, we all enjoy getting messages on our special day, so let’s start working towards adding this feature!
How Might We (HMW)
By using the HMW question format we place or focus for the design of this feature:
How might we include this feature in a non intrusive way, flexible to adapt to everybody’s needs?
UI — Finding the placement for the Feature
Adding your birthday
The interviewees have already manifested that they are not willing to add their contacts’ birthdays manually, and being already familiar with Facebook they are already willing to add their birthday date when signing up on Telegram. As we are already aware of the privacy concerns we decided add sharing option, allowing the user show its Birthday date to 3 groups:
- Public
Everybody on their contact list can see this information. - Friends & Family
Only the 20 top used personal chats/ contacts will be able to see this information. - BFFs
Only the 5 top used personal chats/contacts will be able to see this information.
Of course this feature is completely optional, so in case the user would decide not to add this by itself, one of its contacts will be able to add it to their profile in a private manner. For example my best friend might not want to add its birthday date, but I would like to be reminded by Telegram nevertheless. In this case I can go to my friends contact on Telegram and add it manually, in a way that only I can see it.
Birthday notifications and highlights
Notifications are not for everybody therefore Birthdays will be notified depending on the users preferences. Within this option the user can also choose to get notifications from the 3 categories seen above (Public, Friends & Family, BFFs), in order to avoid the user being overwhelmed in case it has many contacts. This option can be easily tailored under the path Settings > Notifications and Sounds > Birthday Notifications section (New section).
Additional to this we will also be able to see birthdays highlights in 2 sections of our app. One will be located on the top menu, while the other will be shown on the profile picture itself. This decision has been taken together with the users, as they saw the need to have a highlight on the profile for better visibility, while the overview allows the user to notice other peoples birthdays that might not be visible at first glance as this contact might not be on the top 7 chats.
Birthday overview on the Top Menu
Telegram’s top menu is expandable, so we take this chance to place the birthday overview here, so is not always visible, but mainly when the menu is expanded. In this way we are not as intrusive but fulfils the users wish to have this information visible.
Please see the placement of the notification indicated with a pink dot.
Birthday overview on the Profile
During the interviews we ask them to join us in a little exercise that focuses on the Chat overview area. Here we could see the preference of the user, and therefore the placement decision.
This option will be also customisable on the Notifications section as shown above (Settings > Notifications and Sounds > Birthday Notifications section), so the user keeps the flexibility that already says to enjoy about Telegram.
User Flow & Low-Fi Wireframe
For this purpose we are focusing on 2 user flows:
- Inserting the users birthday when creating their profile.
2. Wishing a ‘Happy Birthday’ to one of the users contact.
Mid-fi Wireframe Prototype
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User testing
To reach this Mid-fi shown above a user test has been done. Here below you can see some of the elements that had to be optimised for an easier usage of the feature.
Hi-Fi Prototype
Next Steps
Next steps will include further Hi-fi testing and implementation. Once the users start utilising this functions further iterations can be done based on real usage of the feature.
