UX Challenge
UX interview challenge for Elevation Church including three ideas and one designed solution.
My approach
When planning redesigns, I like to gather feedback from both internal stakeholders and end users. Understanding their thoughts, preferences, and pain points is essential for creating successful products.
For prioritization, I use a simple matrix that evaluates ideas across two dimensions: time to implement and effort required (design, research, and development resources). The best solutions a designer can make are those that don't require a rewrite of the back-end.
My recommendations
Location-based personalization on Home — Current state: the Home page is simple and valuable, while the Locations page provides detailed, location-specific information, requiring navigation between pages. Recommendation: allow users to select their location directly from the Home page and dynamically display relevant information. Impact: reduces user effort and friction.
Reconsider usage of shadows — Current state: shadows are used throughout the site as a decorative element. Recommendation: align with industry standards (Apple's HIG and Google's Material Design) by using shadows sparingly and purposefully. Impact: creates a cleaner visual hierarchy and improves usability.
Improve navigation and content discovery (designed solution) — Current state: the app lacks intuitive navigation and easy access to Elevation's full sermon and media library. Recommendation: redesign the app's navigation structure and create a dedicated "Watch" page. Impact: makes Steven Furtick's sermons and Elevation's media library easily accessible.
Designed solution: App navigation & Watch page
Top navigation — Changes made: simplified to show only the page title and user profile; removed the logo, channel slider, and livestream icon. Rationale: reduces visual clutter, provides clarity, and optimizes screen space.
Tab bar — Changes made: implemented a cleaner Tab Bar component from the Katana library (not yet in production); added two new tabs, Watch and Community; replaced "Locations" with "Community." Rationale: "Community" is more inviting; "Locations" feels utilitarian; "Watch" provides access to the full media library.
The Watch page — Problem solved: users currently cannot easily access Elevation's complete sermon and media library within the app. Solution features: hero content (latest/featured/live sermon), channel filters as filters rather than page redirects, horizontal scrolling sections, and sort/filter options. Key benefit: full access to Steven Furtick's sermons and Elevation's media in a low-code, user-friendly interface.