WALTERPICKS · PURDUE EXPERIENCE STUDIO
01 / The brief
My role: UX designer — research, ideation, and prototyping
Timeline: One semester
Team: Purdue Experience Studio student team, working with WalterPicks
The challenge
WalterPicks provides sports insights and betting tools, but its users often turn to other platforms for social interaction. Our team explored how sharing and community features could support that behavior within the product.
Our direction
We explored live chats, leaderboards, and shareable screenshots. Concept testing and sponsor feedback led us to focus on shareable cards: a way to turn sports data into content users could take into their existing conversations.
02 / What the research revealed
We reviewed conversations in the WalterPicks Discord community to understand how people shared information, discussed strategies, and interacted around live sports. We also compared four bet-tracking apps—BettingPros, Outlier, Action Network, and Juice Reel—and the community-focused sports app Real.
Social interaction happened elsewhere.
People already used external communities to discuss games and share their perspectives. We explored ways WalterPicks could support those existing behaviors.
Shared information needed to be easy to understand.
Sports data can become dense quickly. Clear hierarchy and readable statistics mattered when designing content for sharing.
Trust and context mattered.
A shared card needed enough supporting information to help viewers understand what they were seeing.
03 / Choosing a direction
We explored three directions: live chats for game-day discussion, leaderboards with community interaction, and shareable screenshots of sports insights.
Concept testing and sponsor feedback gave shareable screenshots the strongest support. The direction fit existing sharing behaviors and offered a focused opportunity to develop further.
Live chats
Game-day discussion within the app.
Leaderboards
A way to compare activity and connect with the community.
Shareable screenshots
The chosen direction: take useful insights into existing conversations.
05 / Testing & next steps
We tested the designs with participants who had experience with sports betting. We asked about first impressions, clarity, missing information, and overall usability.
Participants generally described the layouts as intuitive and suitable for sharing. Their feedback also pointed to specific opportunities:
• Increase the size of odds and win-percentage text.
• Provide more contextual statistics.
• Explore options for sharing multiple players.
These findings gave us a clear direction for the next iteration: improve readability, add context, and support more flexible sharing.
06 / What I’m taking forward
This project helped me connect community behaviors with interface decisions. The strongest direction supported how people already shared sports information while giving the team a focused design problem to pursue.
Next, I would refine the cards using this feedback and test them in the conversations where people already share sports insights.