Forbes is a global media company with more than 68 million readers worldwide.
The Forbes company offers several products such as Forbes Magazine, Forbes Marketplace, and Forbes Advisor. For my app redesign, I wanted to focus on Forbes Advisor — a leading B2B publication under the Forbes brand. As a contributing journalist for Forbes Advisor, I wanted to work on a project that combined my passion for content and product design.
Note: This redesign is not by the official Forbes team. This is my app redesign concept made with the help of Professor Toni Allen and Professor Izzy Rashid at George Brown College.
Forbes is a leading publication, but its mobile app is lacking. On Google Play, the app has a 3.8 star rating with a quarter of users rating it with 1 star.
Based on the top reviews, the app's interface has been criticized for feeling outdated, with some describing it as clunky and not user-friendly. Although the content is great, the app is cluttered without a lot of room for headlines and photos
Some users complain that the app lacks usability. People who subscribe to Forbes print magazine have had difficulty accessing digital content through the app because the platform lacks the seamless integration found in other popular publications like The Economist, which offers both audio and digital versions. Other users complain it lacks features for reading offline, accessibility, and saving articles.
Overall, many long-time Forbes readers are disappointed with the app's functionality, particularly when compared to more polished competitors.
I conducted surveys among news readers from two age groups: youth (15 to 25 years old) and adults (26 years old and above) to evaluate their interaction with financial news content.
The results revealed the following:
Through feature comparison, I compared the strengths and weaknesses of Forbes with direct competitors such as Google News, New York Times, Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal.
Based on these insights, I made a feature prioritization map. My main focus was the features on the upper right quadrant to complete my prototype.
The user flow is designed around our primary persona, Forbes news readers seeking a seamless and personalized news reading experience.
Users log-in to the mobile app and pick their preferred news categories. From there, they can find a homepage featuring news articles tailored to their preferences.
Next, users can access a ‘For You’ section which features recommended news articles, preferred news categories, journalists they follow, and reading history. In addition, they can access bookmarked or saved articles and alter the reading experience on the settings option.
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The redesigned Forbes app includes several improvements based on key insights.
Users want control over their reading experience. By allowing readers to customize their news feed, save stories, follow favourite journalists, and manage their preferences — they can tailor the app based on their needs.
In the age of AI and fake news, news readers are looking to evaluate the credibility of news content at a glance.
A card-based UI design allows editors to highlight individual content in a visually appealing and engaging manner.
Advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have rapidly changed the way news is created, consumed and published. In recent months, news organizations have leveraged AI-powered tools to generate news articles, summaries, and reports.
What will futuristic news apps with AI integration look like? Based on recent trends, I also wanted to explore how AI can transform the news reading experience through intelligent features for news curation, content personalization, news summarization and fact checking.
The Forbes app redesign prioritized user needs and preferences. During the onboarding process, users can subscribe to their preferred news topics.
Fact Checker provides readers with an enhanced byline which contains more information about how journalists conducted their reporting. The feature aims to increase transparency and provide a better understanding of the reporting process to improve credibility.
News organizations are looking to integrate AI-related features into their digital products. Some of the main features that I included in the prototype are: AI summaries, AI analytics, and AI-driven news curation
The redesigned Forbes app includes several improvements based on a users’ reading habits and newsfeed-style design inspired by social media platforms. The final prototype had three core features:
By focusing on personalization and AI, the researcher hopes that users will be able to find news articles that are relevant to them, have a seamless reading experience, and spend more time reading the news on their mobile devices.
