While at Epic Games as a product designer, I had the opportunity to improve the existing  Support-A-Creator (SAC) program. I had ownership over this project with my lead guiding me at different points.
Tools
Figma
FigJam
Methods
Competitive analysis
User journey map
Personas
Design workshops
Wireframing
Prototyping
Team
Developer Experience
Support-A-Creator
Influencers have a huge impact on playersâ decisions to buy a game. How might the Epic Games Store connect their player community to influencers?
Create a new âCommunity Tabâ in the Epic Games Store, and introduce loyalty incentives for game players to feel connected with their favorite influencers.
Table of Contents
Context
Research
UX Workshops
Ideation
Prototype
Reflection
Influencers and SAC matter to Epic Games
Influencers HIGHLY impact game sales, and the SAC program brings in their partnerships with Epic Games.
Influencers bring in Players (gamers) to Epic Games Store by sharing video, art, and other media content with their fans.
Players are the users of the Epic Games Store, and buys games on this website.
And this is good for Epic Games. Influencers bring in Players, and their purchases increase revenue for game developers and Epic Games.
In turn, the SAC program by Epic Games is great for Influencers, because they get to earn part of the gameâs revenue.
Players feel disconnected with their favorite Influencers in Epic Games...
...and there is also HUGE opportunity to increase Influencer-based sales....
...and there is room for better UX.
Epic's UX compared to its main competitor, Steam
Steam provided a space for Influencers in their platform, which Epic Games Store didn't have.
I dove into both Steam and Epic Gamesâ ecosystems to see how they differed in integrating influencers into the Playerâs game purchasing experiences.
Epic Games had no discovery points for Players to find Influencers.
âThe touchpoint with the highest opportunity is in the Playerâs experience, as marked with the red cricle. In the current design, Players must navigate out of Epicâs ecosystem for Influencer content because there was no space for them.
Envisioning with stakeholders
The ideal SAC would have high touchpoints for Players to connect and follow Influencers.
I conducted and prepared materials for three internal workshops with subject matter experts. This encouraged stakeholder discussions to formulate future visoins of the new SAC experience.
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Stakeholderes such as product managers, developers, influencer relations, operations, and designers, modeled an ideal SAC. Many of the participants were in close communication with Influencers and Players. They brought expertise about the end users into forming a vision.
Modeling an ideal UX for SAC
Embedding touchpoints at every step of the way can increase the visibility and impact of Influencers on Epic Games, while not overwhelming the Players.
Three design insights surfaced from conducting an affinity analysis of the workshops. The following focuses on the experiences of game Players.
A large identified opportunity was to integrate touchpoints for Players and  Influencers to build communities together.
Experts and stakeholders expressed strong interest in loyalty incentives for Players to be rewarded for supporting Influencers.
Players can show off their favorite Influencers by âreppingâ them on their profile pages.
I created an ideal state journey map of Players based on workshop findings. The new journey incorporates Influencer content for Influencer-Player relationship building, Influencer loyalty badges for Players to earn, and show off the badges on the Playerâs profile page in the Epic ecosystem to ârepâ their favorite Influencers.
This will help Players feel more connected with their favorite Influencers, actively engage with Influencer content, and find new games.
Presenting the community âhubâ
Players and Influencers alike can connect and hype their favorite games in a âhubâ called the âCommunityâ tab.
My goal was to lay down foundations to continue work in the future. I prototyped the service designed in the customer journey map.
The following images will show wireframes of what the Community Tab might look like on the Epic Games Store, as well as profile pages of the Player and their friend. These wireframes were presented to stakeholders for further design discussion.
I envisioned this design to be fitting under the current game details  page. This is because users often directly search their game of interest. Adding a âCommunityâ tab can help users feel more confident in their purchase, and boost delight as they see many others in the gaming community engage with this game.
Each productâs Community tab showcases Influencer content for a particular game.
Players find Influencer and community created content here to inform their game purchasing decisions.
Players can show off badges earned through supporting the Playerâs favorite Influencers.
Players can check out their friendsâ achievements and Influencer badges. This helps create visibility to Influencer-supporting communities, and space to express their interests.
Learning how to scaffold conversations across cross-functional teams
Through this experience at Epic Games, I was thrilled to work on a project that could involve industry stakeholders. With the support of my team, I was able to kickstart a series of workshops to talk about drastic improvements to the Support-A-Creator program.
The cross-communication I did with various teams was the meat and potatoes of creating these workshops. I hope to bring the methods I used to visually scaffold conversations into my next step as a Product Designer.