Prequel Competitions
An app for teens to build projects with peers and take their goals more seriously
Work
Research
No-Code MVP
iOS App Design
Timeline
Jan 2023 - Mar 2023
Role
Head of Product
Introduction
Prequel is competition where participants win cash by setting and achieving their own goals. They're are grouped into teams. Each participant sets their own goals and wins points for achieving them. The team that achieves the most ambitious goals wins.
My Role
I led the design of this product, built the low-code MVP, and tested different user acquisition channels. I worked with one engineer and the community played a large role in building the product with us.
Problems
Programs and extra-curriculars take time away from personal projects. Many participants in the competition had their own personal goals and projects they were working on before. However, their busy school and extra-curricular schedules were preventing them from working on their projects.
Small milestones don't feel rewarding. Progress on long-term goals and projects can feel intangible. It's hard to stay motivated and feel accomplished along the way.
There aren't many like-minded people nearby. The most ambitious teens are in a different league than their peers. They don't have anyone else to bounce ideas around with in school or their local communities.
Goals
Reward progress on ambitious goals.
Give young people the freedom to get stuff done.
Provide a community for young builders and self-starters.
Process
Research
I started my outreach by joining discord servers for young builders. I sent a few messages offering up the idea of competitions and a calendly link for an onboarding call. During these calls, I'd ask them about their projects, reasons for joining, and what they were struggling with. Most of the participants spoke about the challenge to stay motivated, keep themselves accountable, and not having time to work on their projects.
Different personas has specific sources for their problems. There were two distinct personas.
Personas
Too Smart for School
Teens in this segment were looking to be taken seriously and challenged at a higher level. They were typically male and ranged from freshmen to seniors in high school. The participants in this category were already working on developing skills, like coding, or working on projects, like launching rockets. Their projects were often so ambitious that most people considered them unrealistic.
The Resume Builder
The teens in this category were typically sophomores or juniors in high school. They were evenly split between males & females. The participants in this category were working on projects related to other extra-curricular programs or wellness goals. They needed an extra accountability and motivation boost.
Designing the Format of Competitions
The format of the competition was designed to celebrate progress on long-term projects, fit into participants' busy schedules, and cultivate a community for ambitious teens.
How the Competition Works Rounds The competitions took place over a series of rounds, with prizes being awarded at the completion of each round. To make things flexible, participants weren't required to join every round. Stages of a Round Goal Setting Participants join a round by entering the goals they planned on achieving that round. Community Rankings Participants anonymously rank each other's goals by level of ambition. The number of points achieving a goals was worth was defined Start of the Round — Time to Work on Goals After the community rankings each other's goals, the leaderboard is shared with the participants, they're free to work on their goals. There are no mandatory schedules, meetings, or time commitments through-out a round. We rely on the community rankings to motivate participants. End of the Round — Points awarded for achieved goals. You win points by providing evidence that you've achieved your goals. The person who sets and achieves the most ambitious goals wins the round. Write a Reflection — Bonus points in future rounds. If you don't achieve your goal, you have the opportunity to write a reflection. Reflections help you recover points, giving you a boost in the next round.
Launching With a Low-Code MVP
To test the format of the competition as quickly as possible, we created an MVP with Airtable. The MVP wouldn't have been possible without the extensive use of scripts and formulas.
The Home Page
To help users navigate to different stages of the competition
Facilitators would use checkboxes and formulas to hide and show the "Start →" buttons.
Goal Setting
Before the start of the round, users would enter their goals into the competition.
Community Ranking
Once users enter their goals, they anonymously rank each other's goals by level of ambition. The average ranking of each goal defines how many points achieving it is worth.
Before the community ranking stage, facilitators would run a script. For every user in the round, the script would create a rating entity for every goal in the round. Each rating entity was then assign to a user to rate.
Leaderboard
After the community ranking stage, the results are posted on the leaderboard. During this stage, we give participants the time to independently work on their goals and let the leaderboard motivate them to do so.
Results & Reflection
Points are awarded to users who achieve their goals. The user that achieves the most ambitious goals wins the round.
If a participant didn't achieve their goal we would give them the opportunity to write a reflection. Reflections would give users the ability to reclaim 25% of their points, which could be applied to future rounds.
Depending on whether or not the user achieved their goal and has written a reflection, we shoe either an opportunity to recover points or the amount of points they've recovered. We also showed the total number of points they can and have recovered. This functionality was made possible by formulas.
iOS App
With the low-code MVP, we achieved a 66% retention rate. We were also able to resurrect 21% of users. In many of our conversations with resurrected users, they told us that the reason they dropped off was because they weren't able to join on mobile.
77% drop off from Airtable Sign Up to Joined a Round requires a transition from mobile to desktop
When we looked at our analytics, we noticed 70% of our landing page traffic was on mobile and 100% of the users who signed up via our form had also created Airtable accounts. Some even downloaded the Airtable mobile app. However, Airtable Interfaces wasn't supported It was pretty clear that we needed to build an app.
We tested a couple of different navigational styles with users until we landed on a scroll-based navigation.
Version 1: Hierarchical Navigation
We started with a hierarchical style of navigation. However, opening the app to a list of rounds rather than opening the app directly to a round made the desired next steps feel less actionable.
Version 2: Flat Navigation
When we switched to the flat style of navigation, the next steps felt more actionable and immediate. However the segmented controls, for navigating between stages of the competition, made it difficult to know what stage the user was in.
Version 3: Scrolling Navigation
We ended up going with a scrolling navigation that would change based on the stage of the competition. It felt the most actionable and made the stage of competition very clear.
The Final Design
Start of a Round
Goal Setting Input
Goal Rating Input
Leaderboard
Final Results
Collapsible Round Schedule
Feedback
"I've enjoyed Prequel Competitions and it definitely helped me make progress on my goals. There's a big strategy thing I didn't think of where I could've made a lot more goals and prioritized actually achieving them based on what's most realistic within the deadline and are ranked highly." Ian
"Prequel Competitions was seriously the most fun and entertaining way to stay motivated and on track with my goals. Having accountability and support from the group made all the difference in keeping me focused and determined to succeed. This competition is a must-try for anyone looking to make positive changes in their life." Toan
"Prequel Challenges has given my team and I the opportunity to compete through trial and error with people at the same level as us, not to mention while earning money along the way." Josh