Heirarchy

Background

I'd like to preface that, above all, this is a joke.

During a recent family reunion, someone jokingly asked the grandparents about their favorite grandchildren. We all laughed and moved on, but it got me wondering–if my grandparents had picked favorites, it would be pretty hard for them to keep track. They had their fair share of children and grandchildren (and now great-grandchildren), and their memory wasn't great near the end.

Thus, the idea was born: help grandparents stack-rank their children and grandchildren.

When I asked myself why grandparents might want to do this, the answer was immediately obvious: so that they could weaponize their ranking to spend more quality time with their loved ones. Their primary Job-To-Be-Done was to have positive interactions with their children and grandchildren. If the best way to encourage these positive interactions was by pitting their posterity against each other in exchange for a larger inheritance, so be it.

Design Principles

1. Feel real. Despite being a joke, Heirarchy shouldn't seem like one. This was entirely for my benefit–I think it's much funnier when it's subtle.
2. Zero onboarding friction. Visitors aren't looking for a heavy tool that they will invest time in–they're looking for a quick laugh from a fun website.
3. Zero budget. This was purely for fun, and I'm not paying any server resources.

Who is my customer?

In actuality, Heirarchy is meant to be a joke. However, in accordance with my design principles, I built Heirarchy thinking about the hypothetical customers who will use it.

Heirarchy's ICP (under the assumption that this is not a joke) is US-based, aged 65+, has enough descendants to pit them against each other (3+), and is middle class or upper-middle class (enough assets that their posterity are interested in the inheritance, but not so wealthy that they are relying on trusts/more formal estate planning).

My primary motivation for building Heirarchy was to have a fun project to work on. However, I also wanted to build a project that I could use to learn about the product development process.

They're not particularly tech-savvy, but they spend time on Facebook (where they will share things they find humorous or interesting) and have basic proficiency with computers/smart phones. They also have either a good sense of humor, or are strongly opinionated and like to "tell it like it is."

They love their children and grandchildren, and have a strong desire to spend more time with them.

Decisions and Rationale

Design

1. There's no login, and everything is on one page. This aligns with my "Zero friction" design principle. Not only do I want actual users to get to the content immediately, I want my ICP to be able to see everything they need without difficult navigation–my experience with my grandparents is that they struggle with a hamburger menu, and spend most of their time searching the page they're on looking for what they want.
2. I developed this using free tools. GitHub Pages is hosting it (which is free). All memory and operations are client-side. This supports my "Zero budget" design principle.

Features

1. I decided that, beyond ranking posterity, this had to include will generation. This is for two reasons. First, if it's just a ranking, it doesn't have nearly as much "teeth" motivating posterity to act. Second, this is a unique way to do estate planning, and other sources are not built for a division of wealth like this–I'm not able to point them to another source, particularly one that handles wills that change as regularly as these do.
2. The will that is generated is an actual, legal will. It needs to be filled out and notarized before it's binding, and users should consult with a lawyer before using it, but it can actually be used. The "Feel real" design principle demands that the site be completely functional.
3. The ranking is done by points, and points are generated through actions that can be taken by almost anyone and that are, theoretically, valued by my ICP (although, some of them are meant to be humorous). The primary goal of Heirarchy is to help users have more quality interactions with their posterity. I believe that is more successful if the ranking is objective and within the control of the individuals being ranked.
4. Users can download an image of their ranking that is optimized for sharing on social media. My ICP is active on Facebook, and I expect them to share their ranking there. This is essential to let their posterity know how they're doing, and it also is a path to organic, user-led growth.