Hey everyone!
Welcome back to our series, which spotlights the talented product designers who shape your Fandom experience. We're excited to continue pulling back the curtain and introduce (or perhaps reintroduce) you to another group of creative minds behind the scenes.
These designers, working in tandem with your feedback and their team's ingenuity, are a driving force behind Fandom's ongoing evolution. Their passion lies in understanding your needs, incorporating your valuable input, and transforming ideas into features that make Fandom more intuitive, engaging, and enjoyable for editors and fans.
In this next installment, we continue to dive deeper into another of the worlds of our talented designers. Get to know them, discover the philosophies that guide their work, and learn about the projects that ignite their passion. We'll also explore their perspectives on accessibility, collaboration, and the exciting possibilities that lie ahead for Fandom. Their personal stories are sure to inspire and build a connection between you and the people shaping your Fandom journey.
We hope you continue to be motivated by their journeys, gain valuable insights into the design process, and learn how to provide even more impactful feedback. Get to know Fandom's Principal Product Designer, Audrey Jardin! She's no stranger to the entertainment industry, and her approach to design is inspiring! Read on as she discusses her thoughts on design at Fandom, input and collaboration, accessibility, and looking ahead.
Meet Audrey[]
Meet Fandom's Principal Product Designer, Audrey!
Tell us a bit about yourself! What sparked your interest in product design, and how did you find your way to Fandom?
Audrey: Hi everyone! My name is Audrey and I am one of the product designers at Fandom. I’ve been at Fandom for 2 years, before Fandom, I worked at Crunchyroll. Fandom covers a wider entertainment spectrum so joining Fandom was a very exciting opportunity. I’ve spent my design career in the entertainment industry, first in broadcast/tv and branding, then moved to product design where we get to shape how users consume their entertainment on a daily basis. Working in entertainment is fun! You get to design what you like to consume hehe.
At Fandom, I’m working with the News & Ratings (N&R) products. The News & Ratings sites are comprised of GameSpot, TV Guide, Metacritic, GameFAQs, Comic Vine and Giant Bomb. Those brands joined Fandom back in October 2022. This year, we've been exploring ways to enrich the Fandom experience with N&R content through a project called "cross-linking" which basically has the goal to expose informative content from these sites on the Fandom wikis that would be useful to our users.
How long have you been designing, and what experiences have shaped your approach to designing content that is useful and fun for users?
Audrey: I’ve been designing for a while! Basic design principles cross platforms and industries, although product design has very particular paradigms and needs, with users at the center of it all. That’s why I chose to shift to product design, because it is an area of design that includes people/users and puts them at the center of design thinking from the very first stage of the design process. We are also all using one or many products (phones, tvs, tablets, video platforms…) and we all love to be entertained so working in that field, you can use your own experience first hand, as well as feedback you get from those around you, in addition to surveys and discussions we have with our users.
As a user, we have different goals depending on what we are consuming at what time. We may want different things, but usually, we want content to be easy to find, clear, digestible, …and fun! Customization, animations, easter eggs,... we all love to be delighted in our experiences, especially when they relate to content we are passionate about.
Design at Fandom[]
What are the biggest challenges and rewards of designing features for the diverse community of users on Fandom?
Audrey: Our editors do a fantastic job creating in-depth experiences and content. Fandom users are a vast crowd with very different goals. We are working hard at finding new ways of exposing information and data to users in a manner that is not invasive but easy to find. Our pages can be crowded. Working alongside editors who know not only their topics but also their communities well is a big goal of my team and I. N&R properties have valuable information that can enrich Fandom users’ experiences. Casual users may want more superficial information while they browse as opposed to dedicated gamers for example who want to dive in the meaty details. What to display where and when….the million dollar question. Coming up with a feature that meets editors’ and business needs while being of interest to our users is a delicate balancing act we take to heart every day.
Can you share a specific example of a project you're particularly proud of? How did it impact users' experiences on the platform?
Audrey: Statistics are really fun to design, they are also super informative to the gaming community. GameFAQs provides detailed stats about games so the N&R team is working on a widget that would provide that data on Fandom in a fun, interactive manner. We’re still experimenting, it hasn’t been productized yet, but everyone who sees it gets excited, and that includes many gamers!
Fandom wikis cover a wide range of topics. How do you ensure your design choices are adaptable and relevant to such a wide range of interests?
Audrey: We are testing different ideas of what content to expose where and when on wikis, to assess the level of interest and to make sure it is a net positive for the wikis and our users. There is not one pill that fits all solutions, we want to connect dots that want to be connected.
Feedback and Collaboration[]
How do you gather feedback from editors? What are some effective ways for them to provide input that directly influences your design decisions?
Audrey: We are working closely with our community team, getting their input from the brainstorm phase of a new idea. We’ve had a roundtable and created a discord channel to show visuals of ideas to editors and get their feedback directly. Testing a new idea on the site for a limited amount of time is another way to get data/feedback from users and editors. We also work with our fantastic user research team that gets us useful feedback from users while we work on a project.
We’re continuously working at finding more ways to get that direct connection to our editors regarding the N&R content.
What qualities do you value most in feedback? What makes certain suggestions more actionable and impactful for your design process?
Audrey: The whys in an answer are very useful. Detailing what works and doesn’t such as location, color/theming, behavior and providing suggestions on what would better the feature or what else you would like to see/use are very precious to the team.
Fandom Favorites & Accessibility[]
How does accessibility factor into your design process? How do you ensure the editing tools are inclusive and usable by editors with diverse abilities and needs?
Audrey: I love the breadth of information that everyone can participate in creating. The amount of dedication, care and time spent by our editors is impressive. We need to ensure everything in the wiki is readable by everyone. We have designer tools we use constantly to make sure things like contrast pass the standards set by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) for example. And that is just one of them.
Looking Ahead[]
What exciting design projects or initiatives are on the horizon for Fandom's News & Ratings content? What can editors look forward to in the future?
Audrey: We have a lot of data and information that will be interesting to a wide range of users. We hope gamers will be pleased with getting really cool data with stats. We’re expanding to other areas of entertainment. Stay tuned!