The Challenge

AOL.com’s homepage work focused on a core audience of women ages 30–50. Within AOL Lifestyle, horoscope content offered an opportunity to build on a familiar reason to return. We received horoscope content through a Tarot.com API, and I remember the subsection performing well, although the original performance figures are no longer available.

The opportunity was to give that content a stronger mobile experience. A daily reading could be personally relevant, but its value extended beyond a block of text: people were thinking about work, family, love, and the people in their lives. A standalone concept needed to make those connections useful while keeping the daily reading easy to reach.

The February 2014 brief also set an organizational ambition: demonstrate AOL’s mobile design capabilities and strengthen its app presence. It explicitly identified the tension between a distinctive experience and information or feature overload. (Below) Production released updates made to the lifestyle section introducing new visual styles and content formats expanding on Horoscope themes.

Role

Principal Product Manager
(AOL)

Industry

Digital Media / Lifestyle

Duration

2 Months

Services

Product Strategy, Product Concept, User Research, UX Leadership, Prototyping

Deliverables / Platform

Mobile Prototype

Vision

The native mobile application concept “Moira” centered on a recurring moment: checking a horoscope near the start of the day. Research confirmed that this was an established habit, particularly within the cohort we were targeting. That gave us a starting point for the product: support an existing ritual, then explore reasons to continue beyond the initial reading.

The vision combined personal forecasts with social discovery. Users could connect accounts, bring friends into the experience, and explore compatibility for friendship as well as romantic interest. The social idea included friends and friends of friends, rather than treating the concept solely as a dating product.

Approach

1. Build from an existing content partnership

I used the AOL horoscope experience and Tarot.com relationship as the foundation for the concept. The task was to shape a mobile proposition around available content and audience interest.

2. Connect the reading to everyday relationships

I focused the product concept on the themes people brought to their readings: work, family, love, and friendship. With the visual designer, I explored how those themes could become interactions rather than remain abstract categories.

3. Explore distinct visual approaches

Our two-person team explored two named directions. “Elegant Space” used constellations, layered depth, zodiac-specific colors, and proposed animated transitions. “Audrey” used an editorial layout with profile photography, continuous scrolling, compatibility modules, and lifestyle content.

The directions offered different ways to express the same opportunity: an immersive daily reading or a broader personal content experience. I partnered on the product direction and concept development; the visual design was a collaboration with the visual designer.

The Solution

The delivered work was a mobile product concept supported by prototypes and visual exploration. Daily forecasts formed the core, with social compatibility and lifestyle modules extending the experience. Optional ideas included fashion content from StyleList and sponsored commerce placements

The Takeaway

A recurring content habit can provide a useful starting point for product exploration. This project shows how I connect an audience insight, an existing partnership, and a small design team to develop a concrete product concept.

Have an established audience or content partnership with room for a new product? Work with Color Culture on product strategy and prototyping.