Designing Engaging Digital Experiences for Career Platforms

Context

Role: Design Research Intern

Company: Symplicity Corporation (Mobile App Team)

Timeframe: 4 months

Team: Product Managers, UX/UI Designers, Front‑End Developers

Project Overview

The goal of this project was to understand and improve user engagement, retention, and growth for an educational mobile app used by college learners. Symplicity observed significant user drop‑off after onboarding and inconsistent usage patterns, indicating low sustained motivation. To address this, the team explored gamification as a UX strategy to motivate users and increase long‑term engagement — an approach supported by studies showing gamification enhances retention and participation in digital products.

Role & Responsibilities

As a Design Research Intern, I was responsible for:

Aimed to understand and improve user engagement, retention, and growth for an educational mobile app used by college learners.
Identified significant user drop-off after onboarding and inconsistent usage patterns, indicating low sustained motivation.
Recognized these challenges as barriers to long-term engagement and continued app usage.
Explored gamification as a UX strategy to motivate users and encourage ongoing participation.
Grounded the approach in existing research demonstrating that gamification can enhance retention, motivation, and participation in digital learning products.
Sought to align gamified design elements with educational goals to support sustained engagement among college learners.

This role required cross‑functional collaboration, balancing user perspectives with business goals for retention and monetization.

Problem Statement

Users of career and jobs platform/app exhibited high early drop‑off post-onboarding and inconsistent return-on-engagement. This behavior threatened key outcomes tied to learning effectiveness and subscription revenue, as ongoing app usage was essential to delivering value.

Research Objectives & Question

RQ:
How might we design gamification elements that meaningfully increase engagement and retention in an educational mobile app without compromising usability or educational intent?

Objectives
1. Identify behavioral patterns and motivational factors in current app usage
2. Understand what motivates users to return and engage over time
3. Determine which gamification elements (e.g., points, badges, leaderboards) resonate with the target audience
4. Generate UX recommendations to inform the design of engagement‑boosting features

Methodology

Survey (Broad Quantitative Insight)

Participants: 109 college learners (Freshman & Sophomores)
Recruitment: Voluntary via email and in‑app prompts
Approach: A structured survey gathered data on user habits, motivations, and engagement drivers
Analysis: Thematic analysis was used to identify patterns in user responses, enabling prioritization of desired features and behaviors.

Due to an NDA, specific findings aren’t publicly detailed, but the synthesized insight aligns with broader research on gamification’s impact on engagement.

Findings & Insight

Reward motivates engagement: Users are significantly more likely to engage with the app when rewarded with recognition mechanisms such as points, badges, and status.
Gamification taps into intrinsic motivation: Elements that signal progress and achievement drive repeated interaction and a sense of accomplishment.
Recognition over functionality alone: Users value social feedback and progress indicators as much as core functionality — a dynamic supported by UX research on gamification’s effectiveness.

Design Implications & Recommendations

Based on user engagement insights and behavior patterns, the following UX features are suggested to enhance motivation and interaction:

Progress Indicators: Visualize user progress through dashboards, levels, or streaks.
Recognition & Rewards: Use badges, titles, or visual cues to acknowledge accomplishments.
Structured Tasks: Break workflows or learning into clear, goal-oriented steps or challenges.
Immediate Feedback: Provide responsive cues (animations, notifications) to reinforce actions.
Community Features (optional): Facilitate social sharing or collaborative elements to encourage engagement.

Note: Recommendations are generalized and do not disclose confidential or proprietary client information. These recommendations reflect standard gamification practices shown to increase retention and motivation across app domains.

Outcome & Impact

While specific feature implementation metrics weren’t public, the core UX recommendation was clear:

Implement structured gamification elements that recognize and reward user achievements to drive repeat engagement and increase app retention.

This aligns with broader research showing game‑like features enhance user interaction, particularly when tied to intrinsic motivators such as mastery and status.