Terrace-CaseStudy

Who are you, really?

We're always scrolling through feeds, observing the lives of others and carefully curating our social media personas that we leave little time to think about who we really are.
Terrace is an app I created to encourage people to find their true selves and reflect on their days – in a private and honest space – for no one, but only themselves.

THE PROBLEM

How can we help people find their true selves?

Social media has transformed our lives for better or for worse, but there’s one thing that’s certain: we spend too much time watching the lives of others and caring too much about how our own lives appear.

With that, our sense of "self" has become blurred. I wanted to create a platform where people can be themselves – their true selves – and live a more meaningful life.

THE SOLUTION

Meet Terrace, an app that allows users to share their thoughts, aspirations, ideas, emotions

in a private and honest space – for no one, but only themselves.

Mission

To help people spend time thinking about themselves and their lives and discover a true sense of “self.”

Product goals

To record your present.

To reflect on your past.

To set goals for the future.

Record your present

What’s on your mind? Whether you’re sitting in a café or journeying on a long car ride, take a moment to write down what you’re doing and how you’re feeling.

Reflect on your past

Who were you a year ago? What were you doing on Christmas five years ago? How’d you feel when you got your first job? Be reminded of who you were and what your life was like.

Set goals for the future

Saving up to buy a house or trying to lose 10 pounds – whatever your priorities may be, set concrete goals for the short-term or long-term and track them.

HOW THE PROJECT BEGAN

The project began with three assumptions, which were tested with user interviews:

I started this project with three assumptions:

• People spend too much time thinking about the "others" on social media.

• It has become harder to achieve our goals with all these various distractions.

• People rarely spend time thinking about their true identities and their own lives.

Interview script

Topic maps

To understand social media behavior:

1. What do you usually do on social media?

2. What do you think are the pros and cons of social media?

3. How does social media affect your life?

To understand how people spend time thinking about themselves:

1. How much time do you spend thinking about yourself?

2. What do you do when you’re alone?

3. Do you think you need more time to think about yourself?

To understand how people achieve their goals:

1. What’s your goal in life/career?

2. What are you doing to archieve your goals?

3. What’s the most challenge to get your goal?

User quotes

"Not having enough time for personal work."

"Stressful! Keeping up with self-imposed perfectionism and balancing expectations from others."

"To be honest, I love to think about myself in a way to improve myself to better version of me."

"Yes, I need more time to reflect on myself; spend too much time thinking about others."

Key learnings

Social media

People use social media to kill time when they’re bored – but this is not necessarily viewed in a bad way. They enjoy having this personal time on their phones.

Time

People don’t have much time to think about who they are and are always looking for ways to improve themselves.

Goal

People spend too much time thinking about others. This can distract them from their own lives, work, and goals.

Key learning goals

User sign-in

Can users sign in intuitively?

In the original design, users would type in their e-mails and passwords without any guidance. Wanting the process to be more intuitive, I added in an extra line to make the e-mail input section more prominent and also added in an open eye icon to give the option of making the passwords visible.

My design decision

Final design

Writing an entry

Can users seamlessly write an entry?

In the original design, users would tap “Add your story,” which would lead them to a page where they can write an entry and post it, much like on social media platforms such as Facebook or Instagram.
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However, I wanted to differentiate the app and make it more like a diary or note, where users can seamlessly go back and forth to edit their posts and record their trail of thought. In the new design, users can write a post by clicking a tab, much like a page in a diary.

My design decision

Final design

System status

Can users easily access their past posts?

In the original design, users could access their favorite past posts – “memories” – by scrolling through pages and pages of previous entries. To simplify the process, I divided the memories into folders (months) to make it easier to access and also labelled the number of total memories. Additionally, I spaced out the design to make it less cluttered.

Takeaway

First and foremost, I realized the importance of having a prototype ready early on and testing it with as many users as I can. This is very much in line with the “Agile” way of thinking, where instead of aiming for perfection from the beginning, it’s about the continued process of trial and error, development, and feedback.
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Secondly, I found that assumptions are just the beginning and user testing will help develop learning goals, which will become crucial to taking the app to another level. The learning goals can transform a product and make it better than previous versions.

Lastly, interviews and prototype testing with potential users gave me an important insight about human behavior: people enjoy alone time on their phones and want more time to freely think about their lives. This guided the design of my app as I focused on how to create an experience that’s honest, seamless, and meaningful for users.

I hope Terrace can become a place where individuals come to confide their thoughts, their joys and frustrations, and take a break from the world.

HOW THE PROJECT BEGAN

Brainstorming

Roadmap

Sketches