Brainstormed different solutions.
Created user personas.
Performed user testing.
Video chats have become a norm among friends and coworkers but the work of processing non-verbal cues along with the frequency of meetings can cause users to experience Zoom fatigue. There is still room for people to express and communicate on different levels in the chats.
To improve the interactions and alleviate Zoom fatigue, we can add layers of communication to make users feel more connected and engaged. The area I’m focusing on is the ability to react using gifs and emojis within the videochat. Adding this of communication will give people more cues to latch onto and allow people to express more of themselves in the meeting.
I created a survey to better understand how people use gifs and emojis and how they use Zoom.
Of the users surveyed, 86.7% believed that emojis and gifs expressed emotions that written messages, voice and video could not express. This showed me that people viewed emojis and gifs as expressive tools that other modes of communication couldn't exactly replicate.
I also asked about the context in which users used emojis and gifs and the first three answers were 'to lighten the mood', 'to express frustration' and 'to show support'. All of these emotions would be useful in increasing user engagement and decreasing fatigue in video chats.
Albert | 32 | Marketing | Atlanta
WANTS/NEEDS
BEHAVIORS
Jane | 27 | Psychiatrist | Cincinatti
WANTS/NEEDS
BEHAVIORS
I took a look at two apps that were similar to Zoom in its utilization of videos and emojis - Youtube Live and Twitch. Both have a window for video with a side chat bar with an emoji menu.
In Youtube Live, the chat is a prominent part of the experience - it shows up next to the video as a default and people are able to view and enter messages and emojis. On the other hand, the chat function in Zoom is hidden as a default and used more sparingly. Since viewers would mainly be looking at the video window of the app, I wanted to look further into how people can see emojis and reactions without having to open the chat side bar.
Youtube Live
Twitch is also sectioned off by video and a chat bar on the side but one feature that differentiates it is an available widget that allows users to show emojis in the video window by entering them in the chat. This feature brings a new aspect of user interaction. People can more easily show support and it makes for a more fun environment when everyone can view and partake in a shared experience. The added challenge with Zoom was being able to view user reactions when there are multiple video screens.
Twitch
Below are competitor examples of emoji and gif menus. In Slack's emoji menu, I appreciated the 'Frequently Used' section that made often used emojis easy to access. Kakao and iMessage utilized a row of buttons to go through different pages of emojis. I also thought the GIF keyboard utilizing two compact columns was displayed gifs of different sizes well.
Slack
Kakao
GIF Keyboard
There were two main parts I wanted to tackle when integrating emojis and gifs into Zoom - the menu to choose the reactions and the placement of the reactions in the video chat.
These are some of the ways I modified the reaction menu:
Reaction Menu
Emoji Page
GIF Page
In the current Zoom client, once the user clicks on an emoji it's shown on the user's video screen on the top left. In larger Zoom meetings, people's attention would be going back and forth from the speaker to the users who are posting reactions on their own screens.
I wanted people's reactions to be viewed in an expected place so users wouldn't have to move their attention in so many different directions. These are a couple solutions I came up with.
Thumbs up reaction in current Zoom
V1
One solution I came up with was using a conveyor belt to roll out the reaction. I got this inspiration from sushi restaurants that have revolving belts that hold different types of sushi. If something's put on the conveyor belt, it can have its time in the sun and be viewable for a set amount of time. It would also be slightly less distracting than a reaction moving on different directions of the zoom screen.
Conveyor belt solution
V2
This is the solution I came up and ultimately decided to move forward with.
Zoom bot solution
I split the Zoom bot window into two sections, one for gifs and one for emojis. I wanted to make sure there was enough room in the window to view the gifs and emojis at the same time as well as the name of the user that posted it.
Zoom bot screen
When I was user testing, one of the users asked what this feature would look like when Zoom was in Spotlight mode. When Zoom is in Spotlight, it makes one video screen large and puts the users’ screens in a bar.
I thought the best way to make the bot screen act was like a speaker. Normally when someone speaks, their placement is moved up in the bar. So when someone put in a reaction, it would activate and move up in priority on the bar.
But the information was small and difficult to see when the bot screen was in the bar, in particular the emojis. To solve this, I decided to have it take up the whole screen instead of just part of the screen.
New reaction format in bar
Here is how the full window would look when the group enters reactions.
This project was fun to tackle because Zoom is a product that I'm using with people nearly every day. The goal for this project was to bring levity and more expressive ways to communicate so users could be more themselves and have a more interactive Zoom experience.
The most difficult part of the project was coming up with different solutions. I thought about what was possible within Zoom’s guidelines and then considered where I could stretch the app. Feedback from users encouraged me along the way, some saying that they only talk in gifs. Hopefully a feature similar to this can be added in the future to make for a more personal video chat experience.
