Introducing Trust
How do you connect with your trusted network and improve your career?
Challenge
Design an MVP for a product that makes it easier to share connections and expertise without the baggage of existing platforms. Intronet had previous success with a Chrome plug-in but wanted to create something more engaging.
My Role
I was the lead designer on this project, covering all aspects of design from branding to UX. I owned the research, the product direction, and the visual design end-to-end, working directly with the founding team to shape the product from the ground up.
Process
Starting with research based on the customers of the existing product, I set out to create a place where people could get help from trusted members of their real-world networks. I researched what other networks were doing and users' satisfaction with them. We decided that the trust and transparency that peer groups had offline would be a solid foundation.
Research surfaced two main themes in the competitive landscape. First, people didn't trust that information they were getting through LinkedIn, Facebook, and other sources was reliable. Second, endless feeds treated everything with equal weight, making it hard to discern what was most important.
I used this research to design three core parts of the platform: evaluating users' relationships with their contacts, asking for advice and helping peers, and weighting answers based on how strong their relationships were. This manifested in a curated daily feed — not endless scrolling, but a limited set of actions that would take less than half an hour. Each user's relationship strength was visible to them but kept private from their community, helping them weigh what they received.
A fresh brand
A small set of actions
Your professional network
Custom icons
Onboarding
Results
In early user testing, people reacted positively to the app. They were willing to share their contacts and engage with the app's features. We had built a digital product that let users privately leverage their offline relationships. An Intronet investor shared this feedback:
"What you've designed and helped build for us is a quality user interface that you have much to be proud of, and your effort has helped get us to this stage." — Intronet Investor
Intronet’s IP has been acquired.