Entourage App Redesign
Entourage is a French non-profit that fights social isolation by rebuilding human connections. The app was repositioned from donation-centric to a social connection platform, built around events, communities, and education.
The core belief: social isolation is an invisible crisis with very real consequences. For the most vulnerable, rebuilding human connections is not just helpful. It is vital.
My Role
Junior Product Manager at Entourage in 2023, working alongside the CPO. I contributed to the full repositioning of the mobile app and led the design and delivery of new social features: events, local communities, and educational content. I worked within a small, mission-driven team (2 PMs, 1 designer, 3 developers, 1 CPO, 1 CTO) and collaborated with an external agency working pro bono.
The Problem
A product misaligned with its mission
The Entourage app was originally built around material donation: users could offer goods to people in need. While useful, this approach reflected only a small part of the association's mission.
Entourage's core belief is not that people need stuff. It is that they need bonds. The app was framing homeless people as recipients of charity rather than as neighbors to connect with. And it was not giving volunteers the tools to actually build those connections.
The product gap
There was no way for users to discover local events, join neighborhood groups, or access educational content that could help break down the stigma around homelessness. The app was transactional where it needed to be relational.
Approach & Key Decisions
Learning from the field
One of the most distinctive aspects of this project was how we conducted user research. Our team included a social worker who gave us the keys to understand the reality of people in precarious situations. I participated in maraudes (street outreach sessions) and visits to daytime shelters to meet users where they were.
These sessions were unlike any standard user testing environment. Sometimes the people we met were too tired or too overwhelmed to engage. You take what comes. You listen more than you ask. It teaches you a level of humility that stays with you as a product manager.
These direct observations shaped our product decisions: the app needed to be extremely simple and low-friction, trust had to be established before any engagement, and the value had to be felt immediately.
Reframing the product around connection
The central decision was a full repositioning: moving away from a donation-centric experience toward a social connection platform. This meant rethinking the core use cases from the ground up around three pillars.
Three pillars of connection
Each pillar creates a different, natural reason for neighbors and people in precarious situations to meet.
Local gatherings organized by Entourage or volunteer ambassadors: coffee meetups, football, pétanque, art workshops. Any shared activity that brings people into the same space.
Local neighborhood groups where residents connect, engage in conversations, and build ongoing relationships beyond a single event.
Resources designed to break down prejudices about homelessness. Connection starts with understanding: when people know more, they fear less, and they open up.
The Solution
A redesigned mobile app built around social connection, turning the relationship between volunteers and people in precarious situations from giver/receiver into neighbor/neighbor.
Impact
users registered on the app.
of people supported feel better thanks to the connections made.
Figures from entourage.social, reflecting the platform's cumulative growth since the redesign.