Mobile App Case Study: Wellway
Project goal:
Design a digital product that can help people make positive and lasting lifestyle changes.
INTRODUCTION
America is sick.
An increasing percentage of American adults are overweight, over anxious, and underactive.
I wanted to explore a way for people to take back control over lifestyle decisions, such as exercise, nutrition, and sleep, that impact their health.
What are people supposed to do?
The health and wellness market has an abundance of products and services. What it has in sophistication it lacks in simplicity.
How do we make it easier for people to get started and stay on track?
RESEARCH
Key observations from a survey and in-person interviews:
Many people have a gap between their actual vs. desired health
Some people don’t know how or where to start
Many people struggle to find the time
Competitive Analysis
A common theme among the popular health & wellness apps was the large amount of data collection. Many apps and products relied on users to spend a lot of time recording information, and then expected users to make decisions from a variety of options.
Personas
“How might we motivate people to take that bold, first step?”
Being mindful of who might benefit from this approach to health & wellness, I wanted to be conscious of users’ specific needs and pain points when making design decisions.
I developed a few personas, some loosely inspired by interviewees from the research phase.
How Might We…
“How might convince people to prioritize time for self-care?”
DESIGN
Primary Features
Features I thought would be useful in addressing user pain points:
Clear indication of next steps
A snapshot of historical activities to show how far they’ve come
A reward system – digital badges as rewards for completing challenges, positive feedback from community members
“Make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, make it satisfying.”
- The 4 principles of habit change by James Clear, author of Atomic Habits
Each flow had very few alternate paths; I wanted to minimize the amount of thinking required and opportunities for frustration. The sooner a user can complete a task, the sooner they can claim a piece of victory and move on with their lives.
From Low to HiFi
User & Task Flows
The focus of User and Task Flows was to promote simplicity, ease of repeatability, and positive reinforcement.
The “Dashboard” screen was a central piece of this experiment. The final screen was not a far departure from the original sketch, although usability testing informed some late design changes.
I wanted to give users a clear and simple visual of what they’ve accomplished, and what else remains to be done. Encouraging nudges were peppered in to provide extra momentum for users.
LOGO CONCEPT
The inspiration for the name and logo was a highway guide, which provide distance and direction to specific destinations.
The logo concept was to provide a direction for where users could go and the guidance to get there.
TESTING
Prototyping
In preparation for Usability Testing, I created Hi-Fi screens for Wellway’s primary features such as participating in healthy activity challenges, uploading challenge evidence, and viewing one’s historical activity.
Other aspects I wanted to asses were ease of navigation and visual design.
Usability Testing
In Usability Testing, I graded my designs by measuring (1) whether users were able to complete the flow with minimal instruction, and (2) how quickly they were able to do so. High completion rates and relatively fast completion times gave me confidence that most flows were setup optimally. One flow with a slower completion time warranted revisions.
Some users provided invaluable feedback, such as where they took wrong turns, even if they ultimately completed the flow. I incorporated their feedback in post-testing iterations.
CONCLUSION
Change is difficult, regardless of the type of change people are trying to make.
Rather than focusing on willpower or motivation to get people to change their lifestyles, my focus was on creating a system that made lifestyle changes easier to undertake.
By empowering users with the right tools, they can make more intentional decisions rather than responding to outside forces unconsciously.