UX/UI Case Study
Plan With Friends -
A Social Ticketing Feature
Designing a collaborative planning flow for Ticketmaster that helps friends decide faster, share the planning load, and keep everything in one place.
“Plan with Friends” is a feature concept I designed for Ticketmaster during my Designlab capstone to simplify messy group event planning. Research and interviews showed that people coordinate concerts across scattered chats and links, so I explored concepts, mapped flows, and tested wireframes to find clearer solutions.
The final prototype brings group planning into one place with friend invites, shared pages, voting, and lightweight chat—helping friends decide faster and collaborate more easily.
Planning a night out with friends often sounds fun, but in practice it can feel messy and stressful. People send links back and forth, forget to reply, and one person usually ends up doing all the work — from choosing an event to fronting the money for everyone else.
Ticketmaster’s existing flow works well for a single, decisive buyer. But for groups, the lack of in-app collaboration means coordination spills into other tools. That’s a missed opportunity both for users and for Ticketmaster, who could keep people engaged from inspiration to purchase.
To understand this problem more deeply, I explored how people actually plan events together and where the experience begins to break down.
Want a little sneak peak for the solution?
How might we keep group planning inside Ticketmaster and support shared decisions in a way that feels natural and low-pressure?
To understand how people actually plan events with friends, I combined secondary research, competitive analysis and user interviews. This helped me uncover where coordination breaks down and what a supportive in-app feature would need to do.
Secondary Research
95% of fans want to attend more events, but many struggle to find someone to go with or to coordinate plans.
Scheduling conflicts and scattered communication are major blockers to attendance.
Competitor Analysis
I looked at tools like DICE, Eventbrite, WhatsApp and Tricount:
They offer sharing (links, invites) but not a full decision-making flow.
None combine event discovery, group coordination and purchase in one place.
This highlighted a gap for a truly collaborative planning feature within Ticketmaster.
Qualitative Interviews
I interviewed 6 people aged 23–34, from frequent planners to more passive participants. Across conversations, the same themes showed up:
Group chats are messy and decisions drag on.
The same person usually takes charge and feels the pressure.
One person often fronts the cost and then has to chase payments.
Passive participants feel overwhelmed by chat noise and forget to respond.
Empathy Map
This creates slow decisions, frustration for planners, and scattered information. My goal was to imagine a social planning experience that fits naturally into Ticketmaster without overwhelming users or introducing unnecessary friction.
The feature needs to reduce emotional load, simplify decisions, and share the planning responsibility between friends - not just make buying tickets faster.
The Personas
From the research two clear archetypes emerged: the overwhelmed organiser and the easy-going friend who wants to join without doing all the legwork.
Kira – The Reluctant Planner
Kira loves going to events with friends but often ends up organising everything herself. She worries about letting people down, feels responsible for keeping plans moving, and carries the emotional weight of making the “right” decision.
Tom – The Flexible Participant
Tom is easy-going and loves being included, but he often forgets to reply or feels overwhelmed when too many options appear at once. He needs simple choices, clear information, and gentle nudges to stay engaged.
Kira and Tom want to enjoy events together, yet their needs clash in subtle ways. Kira wants support, clarity, and shared responsibility. Tom needs a low-effort experience that keeps him involved without adding pressure.
This tension shaped the core challenge of the project:
How might we help Kira share tasks and decisions in a natural way?
How might we design a flow that prompts Tom gently without pressure?
The Solution: "Plan with Friends"
Plan With Friends brings group planning into Ticketmaster so friends can make decisions without juggling multiple apps. It balances the needs of both planners and passive participants, making the process feel lighter and more collaborative.
Create a group for an event
Start a planning space directly from the event page or your account.
Invite friends
Send invitations via link or directly from your friend list.
Create and vote in polls
Let the group decide on dates, seats, or events with clear, time-bound polls.
Shared dashboard
See all event details, decisions, and next steps in one place.
In-app chat threads
Keep conversation focused around a specific event instead of scattered across chats.
Gentle reminders
Nudge friends who haven’t voted or confirmed yet, reducing pressure on the planner.
Mapping the Journey
Understanding how both roles move through the flow was essential. I mapped the journey from discovering an event to confirming tickets to ensure the feature supported forward momentum rather than adding friction.
The flow highlights two perspectives working together toward a shared decision:
The Planner – starts the group, creates polls, nudges the group forward
The Participant – joins, votes, and stays updated without having to manage everything
Wireframes: From Low to Mid-Fidelity
Once the concept was defined, I moved into wireframing to turn ideas into tangible flows. I started with quick low-fidelity layouts to nail the structure and decision points, then evolved them into mid-fidelity screens that align more closely with Ticketmaster’s existing patterns.
Accessing the feature and creating a group - Version A and B
Inviting friends via Ticketmaster or via link
Group Dashboard with Event overview, Poll and Chat Section + "Create a Poll"- pop-up
Usability Testing - Mid-Fidelity Prototype
To validate the early flow, I ran five short moderated tests with the low-fidelity prototype. I also tested two entry points (Flow A vs Flow B) to see which felt more natural when starting a planning group.
Tasks tested
Start a planning group from an event
Invite friends (via Ticketmaster & via link)
Create a poll
Vote on an existing poll
Navigate the group dashboard to understand next steps
What went well
Users quickly understood the overall concept and liked that planning stayed inside Ticketmaster.
Creating and participating in polls felt simple and clear.
The tabbed navigation felt familiar and aligned with Ticketmaster’s existing patterns.
What could be improved
Flow A was preferred, but some users didn’t notice it immediately — it needed more visibility.
Poll creation lacked feedback (“Did I create the poll?”).
Active vs. closed polls looked too similar; users wanted clear status indicators.
“Invite via Ticketmaster” needed small microcopy to explain how it works.
Key takeaway
The core flow was intuitive, but users needed clearer cues, clearer feedback, and a more noticeable entry point to feel confident throughout the experience.
High-Fidelity v1
After refining the flow with low-fidelity testing, I created the first high-fidelity version using Ticketmaster’s brand identity and interface patterns. This version made the experience feel closer to the real app and addressed the most important early feedback.
Usability Testing – High-Fidelity v1
To validate the updated design, I ran a second round of moderated usability tests with five users. This round focused on the two core tasks:
Starting a planning group and inviting friends
Creating and interacting with a poll
What went well
Group creation and invitations felt intuitive and flexible
The feature felt well integrated into Ticketmaster’s existing experience
Onboarding messages helped users understand the flow
Invite methods (contacts or link) were clear and appreciated
What could be improved
Some interactive elements (like the poll question field) weren’t perceived as clickable
Poll confirmations and deadlines needed more visibility
Navigation back to the group dashboard wasn’t always clear
The homepage pop-up caused confusion as an entry point
Notifications (like “Friend voted”) were often overlooked
Key takeaway
Users completed all tasks successfully, but small usability blockers around clarity, feedback, and navigation needed refinement before the final iteration.
Iterations
Final experience
Discover an event in Ticketmaster and tap Plan With Friends.
Create a group and invite friends directly from the app.
Set up a poll for dates, seats, or events and share it with the group.
Friends vote, chat, and see a shared dashboard with all details.
Once a decision is made, the group moves smoothly into purchasing tickets together
The result is a more collaborative, transparent planning process that keeps the excitement of going to an event together, without the usual stress and coordination chaos.
Reflections & Next Steps
This project taught me how powerful it is to test early and design for different participation styles. Even low-fidelity prototypes revealed issues with navigation and feedback that I wouldn’t have caught from static screens alone.
Designing inside an existing system like Ticketmaster’s meant borrowing familiar components while still pushing for new behaviour – a balance between respecting constraints and advocating for user needs.
Split payments and clearer cost-splitting flows
Group seat reservations before checkout
Richer notification settings and chat features for ongoing planning
This project is part of my Designlab UX/UI Bootcamp. If you’d like to collaborate on a digital product, improve a feature, or bring a new idea to life, I’d love to chat.
