Before the age of emojis, users could only express their reactions with :) happy face or :( sad face through SMS. Creating a void to connect with digital expressions.
Execute the entire app's design and marketing strategy including the admin back-end system.
TextPics is the first creative SMS text-art app to appear on the iPhone. It was a #1 social networking app in 2010, with over 4 million users. Featured multiple times on the Apple App Store and reached 1st place in the Top App categories.
As the first app I ever created, there was a high learning curve in determining the marketing and design elements necessary to complete an app's ecosystem in order to be successful.
Apps being a new thing at the time, we made the design decision to keep the logo similar to the native Apple SMS app. The iconic green message bubble. For our app icon we choose this particular bunny for its graphical simplicity yet well balanced design.
Most apps created a webpage to host information about the app and to inform users of other company products. This provided companies legitimacy vs phony app companies that were engulfing the app store with copycats from foreign countries.
We knew the key to staying relevant was to create features that other copycats would have hard time mimicking and users would adopt and become loyal followers.
Consistent nav bar at the bottom with 4 main sections. The home screen is designed in a list style with categories in alphabetical order.
One of the main features that made us successful was building a method users could create their own TextPics and share with the rest of the community to be featured on "Pick of the Day." This allowed us to retain our users by making it easier to gather new content with minimal team effort.
This bonus feature was a shot in the dark, because we were unsure of its practicality. Knowing it was interesting we included it with the hope users would be receptive.
