Adapt WhatsApp for elderly users

How would you adapt WhatsApp to improve engagement and overcome communication barriers for elderly users?

Context

Many older users depend on WhatsApp to stay in touch with family, but struggle with small text, forwarded misinformation, scams and features hidden in menus.

Clarifying questions to ask first

Which markets?
Engagement with family, or reducing harm?
Separate mode or changes for everyone?

How to approach it

Clarify the business goal and tie the product to the company's mission before touching solutions
Segment users by behaviour or need (not just age), cover the whole ecosystem, and pick one segment with explicit criteria
Walk the end-to-end journey and separate real pain points from feature requests
Brainstorm a range of solutions (quick fix, data/ML, moonshot) and prioritise with impact vs effort
Define a North Star, funnel metrics and guardrails, then call out risks, edge cases and mitigations

Framework: Goal & mission -> Ecosystem & segment choice -> Journey & pain points -> Solutions & prioritisation -> Metrics & guardrails -> Risks & edge cases

Sample answer

Segment by tech comfort: confident, dependent on family help, first-time smartphone users
Family members are enablers and should be part of the design
Scams and forwards are a safety problem, not just UX

Pains: small text, accidental calls, scam messages, cannot find photos family sent
Solutions: simple mode set up by a family member, voice-first replies, scam warnings on unknown senders, forwarded-many-times labels
Metrics: North Star = weekly family conversations by elderly users; guardrails = scam reports, accidental call rate

A family-assisted simple mode with voice replies and scam warnings. Measure weekly family conversations, guarded by scam reports.

What interviewers look for

Segmentation by tech comfort
Family ecosystem (helpers)
Scam and misinformation guardrails
Simplicity vs capability