Sell Your Brains: How We Developed a Marketplace for Creative People Who Want to Monetize Their Art. The Buy My Brains Case

Idea: a platform where creative people can sell the result of their intellectual work

In the spring of 2023, we were contacted by a client who organized events, hung out in creative circles, and knows first-hand the pains of photographers, artists, and other people from the creative industry.

One of these pains is that people have to promote their art themselves through social networks or look for platforms where they can post it, often with a large commission.

The client came up with an idea to solve this pain — create a marketplace where artists can post their works and directly sell them to everyone.

The idea is that the platform sells only non-physical products. The concept is this: artists shouldn’t starve, they should earn with their ideas and brains. Hence the project’s name — buy my brains 🧠

On Buy My Brains, artists, photographers, designers, experts, bloggers, screenwriters, writers, and composers — in short, anyone who can create something non-material — can post their products.

In fact, it’s a P2P platform with two roles: buyer and seller. And no intermediary would take a commission for transactions. On this platform, monetization works like this: the seller can post up to three ads for free. If they want to add more products, they must pay for additional posts. There’s also a paid service for promoting products in the user feed. The service offers a free promotion service in the user feed.

The client had a general idea of how the platform should look and work. She didn’t know how to bring her ideas to life and find the right technical solution for them.

That’s why she started looking for a development team to which she could entrust the project. She was searching for a long time and finally chose us, Purrweb. She liked our cases from the portfolio — it was a total match.

By the way, if you’ve got an idea for a mobile app but you don’t know where to start, dive into our guide — we compiled it for cases like this. It contains 9 clear steps from an idea to product release in stores.

The client had references and some groundwork for the visual part and aesthetics that she wanted to use in the design of the platform. She wanted bright colors, a bit of a hippie mood, and a dose of psychedelia from the 60s. And all we had to do was figure out how to make a finished product from the pictures and description.

These are the materials from our client — the logo, bright palette, and brand style that she wanted to represent in the design of the platform

We considered different product options: a website, a mobile app, or even a PWA. Or should we make everything? We discussed the task and decided to design and develop a mobile app.

But then the client had doubts, which could cancel our cooperation 😿

Presentation for investors. How we helped to remove doubts

The client planned to introduce the idea of Buy My Brains to investors, but she understood that a presentation wouldn’t impress them as much as the real product. That’s why she needed, as she put it, a demo version — to look more convincing in the investors’ eyes.

She came to us with the request to develop a full-fledged app. However, after the initial estimation, she started to doubt whether the budget would be sufficient.

And these are absolutely normal doubts. That’s why we advocate a flexible approach — if we see that we can solve the task in a different way that will let us save the budget, we offer this option. This was exactly the case with Buy My Brains — we saw a more suitable choice that perfectly fit the client’s budget. After all, if you just need to show your concept to the investors, why rush into developing a mobile app?

Instead, we suggested making a website prototype. This would be enough for a presentation to investors. The prototype will show the key features and design and then be used to develop the full-fledged platform.

The website will look like the “real” product — with functioning navigation and links between screens. It will allow users to interact with the UI as if it were a finished product. However, it will not have fully functional logic or a fully developed database.

The client was delighted with this option. We agreed that our team would make a website with a fully developed design and user path demonstration, upload it to production, attach analytics to collect metrics, and provide this data to investors.

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Buy My Brains: how this works

To work out the user flows, we looked at different marketplaces and classifieds, searched for the best solutions, and invented a way to stand out. Pinterest was our main reference.

The Pinterest platform was our main reference — the client liked how the feed and personal account were implemented there. She wanted to make something similar in Buy My Brains.

Buy My Brains has two interchangeable roles — a buyer can become a seller and vice versa. We implemented the main page, the feed, and a seller’s showcase. At the prototype stage, you can’t buy or sell anything on the website, but you can see how everything will work after the full-scale launch of the marketplace.

We helped decide on the flows that would be sufficient for the prototype. We chose the least complex ones to save money.

For example, the client wanted the site to contain a personal account where a seller would upload documents and certificates. However, this would take more time and was not essential for the client’s goals. That’s why we suggested leaving out the account and making the document feature in the seller’s showcase.

A seller can upload certificates via their showcase

Inside the platform, we made a clean and neat design to help users focus on the feed and purchases. But the landing page was a completely different story.

When a little psychedelia won’t hurt: in search of style

Creating a bright visual identity for the landing page proved to be the main challenge in this project. It had to be the identity to remember.

The client wanted us to create a unique and fresh design with psychedelia touches — a design that would appeal to the creative people who were the main target audience of the project. But it was important not to overdo it: the ideas represented in the visuals had to be clear and readable.

We had to find a balance between the vivid and dull UI. We could experiment and play with different typefaces and colors. The main thing was not to lose 😅

Our designers studied references and the client’s wishes, viewed competitors’ products, and collected mood boards for the design concept.

Our mood boards: we chose bold and bright combinations

The client was open to our suggestions, but she had her own creative ideas. For example, she wanted us to use a mind-blowing combination of orange and purple, like in the references she had. Or rather — like in this picture, which — spoiler alert! — would become the basis for the entire style of the platform.

Based on this sketch provided by the client, we invented graphic elements for the platform’s UI

To be honest, our designers were a bit confused by how expressive the combination of purple and orange — nearly red — would be. So, our guys decided to search for other options 🙂

Initially, we suggested these colors — based on the fact that the competitors didn’t use such combinations, which would help create a unique style.

You can see the client’s favorite colors here too, but we decided to distribute them between different palettes

And… our options didn’t meet the client’s expectations. She wanted us to use something brighter. More precisely, she needed one specific combination — orange and purple 🟠🟣 The client explained that, in her mind, she saw the platform in exactly these colors.

We agreed to use them and see what would happen in the end. We revised the colors for the design concept and suggested this palette:

In the design of the main screen, we used the reference — that very eye with a brain instead of a pupil 👁️

We offered two options — psychedelic and psychedelic 🙂 Guess which one the client liked the most?

The client chose the first variant — it was exactly what she needed! Such a bright and catchy design can attract the platform’s audience, which is not that easy to surprise with designer creatives. Also, the client suggested adding a little animation so that the drawn eyes would open and close… Then, we realized that it was time to give complete freedom to our imagination.

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An insanely beautiful landing page & a video with an all-seeing eye and a goose-man

This is the main screen design we made:

Yes, they are alive and moving! We implemented the client’s idea with animation: it turned out unusual and crazy — in a good way

The visuals represent the key idea of the platform: all the achievements and progress are based on human intelligence and thought. The metaphor behind the project is intelligence that opens our eyes to new opportunities.

We used the same style for the “About” section — there, we explained the project’s philosophy and values and introduced users to the platform’s rules

Apart from the text and bright visuals, the client wanted the “About” page to contain a short video that would explain the idea behind Buy My Brains and attract attention. The style had to match the landing page.

She gave us two directions: it had to be either surreal trash, but without going over the top, or something about the universal mind and cosmic scale. Mix, but don’t shake: all the metaphors must be clear to the uninitiated.

We dove into creation, generating ideas of different degrees of weirdness. We wrote a few scenarios before we found our story — the story that revealed the platform’s concept better than the others. The universal mind is closer to us than the trash, so the all-seeing eye is at the center of the story. Of course, it has the brain instead of the pupil 🙂

These are the references that inspired our designers when they were working on the video

B&W sketches of frames for the future video

The static frames came to life when we made an animatic: a storyboard for the video without detailed visualization. It’s a bit like a B&W wireframe, where we determine the element layout for the UI.

The next step was to draw the frames in color. Here, we didn’t skimp on the bright colors.

We draw the frames in color

Check out what we did:

We wanted to represent the metaphor of transferring knowledge and experience from one person to another. The mascot literally absorbs the art of those around him, filling himself with new energy and inspiration.

Speaking of the mascot — what do you think of this goose-man? He was invented by our designer, and the client loved him — he fit in the Buy My Brains aesthetics just perfectly. We also used it to design the “About” page.

Tell the goose man what interests you

In the video, we played with the idea of the all-seeing eye and made a visual reference to the main page. The video itself can be used as an independent promo material.

We found the balance between artistic freedom and the client’s wishes, and together, we worked on the unusual aesthetics of the platform. And when it came to UI/UX solutions, the client fully trusted our expertise.

Result: the client is searching for investors for the project

As a result, we got a bright and catchy project that totally met the client’s expectations in terms of style and aesthetics. She wanted to see how her ideas and hypotheses could turn into a real, market-ready product — and we successfully fulfilled this task ✨

Now, let’s discuss the down-to-earth aspects: we met the budget and deadline, as well as found a suitable variant for solving the client’s business task. We submitted the finished website, and the client collected analytics on users and saw interest in the project. Now, she’s looking for investors to launch a full-fledged platform.

Do you dream about launching your own digital product, but you don’t know exactly how to do it and what is needed? We, Purrweb, are ready to help you. We will listen to you, study your request, and offer you a solution that will fit your budget and deadlines. Fill out the form to contact us.