Catchup — Communities, Activities & Experiences

From Events To Experiences

People don't always want to "attend an event." Sometimes they want to find people with similar interests, learn something new, join a sports group, attend a class, go hiking, or simply discover something interesting happening nearby.

Catchup was conceived as a Sri Lankan-first alternative to platforms such as Meetup — combining communities, activities and events while addressing opportunities more relevant to the local market. The challenge was not to recreate Meetup.

Four Roles, One Ecosystem

Catchup is a community and event discovery platform focused initially on Sri Lanka, connecting four main user types:

The initial product focuses on communities, events, classes, bootcamps, sports, hiking, health and wellness, IT communities, local event discovery and local payment options. A future trip-planning experience was considered but intentionally kept outside the MVP scope.

Turning A Brain Dump Into A Direction

The client wanted Catchup to be similar to Meetup, but with a stronger focus on the Sri Lankan market. The initial brief spanned discovering groups and events, joining interest-based communities, creating groups and events, organizer analytics, venue owner registration, suggested venues, paid events, installment payment options such as KOKO, and admin approval and moderation.

The challenge was turning that broad brief into a clear product direction — deciding what the product actually is before deciding what it looks like.

Starting With The Domain, Not The Screens

Instead of jumping directly into screens, I first looked at the world Catchup would operate in. It sits across several connected areas — and seeing them together changed how I understood the product.

Communities  +  Events  +  Activities & Learning
      +  Payments  +  Venues  +  Trust & Safety

Catchup was not simply an event-ticketing application. It was closer to a local community, activity and experience platform.

Attendee  → Community → Events / Activities → Participation
Organizer → Community → Events              → Attendees
Organizer → Venue     → Booking
Admin     → Users / Groups / Events / Venues   → Governance

Where Catchup Could Add More Value

The goal was not to copy Meetup. The question became: where could Catchup provide more value for the Sri Lankan market specifically?

Four Roles, Four Sets Of Needs

Four primary personas were defined from the project context — each with a distinct goal, distinct friction, and distinct product surface.

From Pain Points To Problem Statements

Supporting that core direction: local payments to make participation more accessible, venue connections to help organizers find suitable spaces, and trust & safety to make the ecosystem safer.

Capabilities Per Role

Organized Around Discovery & Participation

The main attendee experience was structured around two jobs — finding something worth doing, and keeping track of what you've joined. Organizer, venue owner and admin experiences become role-specific workspaces rather than separate products.

Catchup
│
├── Home
│
├── Explore
│   ├── Events
│   ├── Groups
│   ├── Categories
│   └── Map
│
├── My Activity
│   ├── My Groups
│   ├── Upcoming Events
│   ├── Saved Events
│   └── Event History
│
├── Create
│   ├── Create Group
│   └── Create Event
│
├── Notifications
│
└── Profile

Eight Journeys Across Four Roles

Each journey below expands into the step sequence that shaped the flows:

Validating Structure Before Polish

The wireframe stage focused on validating structure and interaction before any visual polish. The first set covered eight screens:

Translating Structure Into Interface

The visual design translates the validated structure into a clear, accessible and scalable interface — built to carry four different role experiences without becoming four different products.

Connecting The Critical Journeys

The high-fidelity prototype connects the journeys that carry the most product risk — discovery, payment, creation and governance:

What The Prototype Needs To Prove

The prototype is designed to be tested with representative users from each role. These are the questions each test needs to answer:

Five Rules That Settled The Arguments

How Success Would Be Measured

This is a concept case study — the measures below are the ones the product should be judged on once built and tested, not results already achieved.

Final Takeaway

Catchup started as an idea for a local version of Meetup. Through the early UX process the opportunity became broader — value for attendees through discovery and participation, for organizers through community and event management, for venue owners through new booking opportunities, and for admins through governance and trust.