UX/UI Design
Metime: App for Self-Reflection and Mindfulness Practice
Overview
The Challenge
Create a wellness app that monitors the users’ progress and encourages them to adopt a healthier lifestyle
Role
UX/UI Designer
Duration
10 days (full-time)
About the project
Our goal was to use an innovative approach to create a refreshing app that could be used for any aspect of personal well-being in only two weeks.
Exploring the Importance of Mindful Habits for a Healthy Lifestyle
We believe that daily mindful habits and routines are crucial to achieving and maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
To better understand the market and problem, we conducted initial research, which included surveys, interviews, and an analysis of competitive features.
Unlocking True Self-Awareness: The Surprising Benefits and Limitations of Mindful Habits
Mindful habits like journaling are already validated techniques to increase self-awareness. They help them to achieve their goals and reflecting on past events. But research has also shown, that people think they are already very self-aware, but actually they aren’t as much as they think.
“Keeping a personal journal a daily in-depth analysis of your experiences is a high-leverage activity that increases self-awareness.” — Stephen R.Covey
“You are 42% more likely to achieve your goals, simply by writing them down on a regular basis.” — Psychology professor Dr. Gail Matthew
“While 95% of people believe they’re self-aware, in reality, just 10% to 15% actually are.” — 5-year research study by Tasha Eurich
Exploring Habits of Self-Reflection
To understand better the current habits of self-reflection and mindfulness we conducted a survey (77 people took part).
8 out of 10 are interested in self-reflection
74% want more self-reflection in life
58% want to practice that daily
They are interested in learning about various techniques, and how to apply them to practice self-reflection and build a routine. Ultimately, the objective of self-reflection is to develop a positive mindset and to grow as an individual.
Understanding the Needs of Self-Reflection Enthusiasts
We required more specific information about the potential user’s behavior and needs. For that, we conducted five interviews with people aged 26 to 30 who are interested in self-reflection. The interviewees were highly interested and already tried various methods and/or read books, but they struggle to incorporate the techniques into a routine and miss overall guidance.
Uncovering the Need for Guided Programs
According to our research findings, there is a high interest in the topic. We compared 6 different competitors regarding their product features to list what they are already providing to satisfy their users.
And even though they are already trying to solve the problem quite well, there are no techniques that properly guide the user or provide access to a selection of methods and explanations on how to perform them.
Concluding our main takeaways:
There are no approaches to properly guide the user or give access to a variety of methods and explanations of how to do them.
There is a need for guided programs.
Mood tracker and daily journaling are proofed concepts.
Say Hello to Mindful Mara
Her interests include self-reflection as well as mindfulness and she reflects when a problem arises, but she doesn’t do it routinely. It is Mara’s goal to develop herself and establish a positive mindset. Her goal is to build a consistent routine that encourages self-reflection and gratitude. However, Mara does not know where to begin and which methods would be most suitable for her. With no knowledge and no guidance, she feels quickly lost.
In order to develop a deeper understanding of her perspective, we designed a user journey map that illustrates her experience trying to find methods to practice self-reflection and to build a routine.
Defining the Problem
The problem statement for Mindful Mara is defined as followed:
Mindful people like Mara, need to find a way to develop a routine for self-reflection, because they struggle without guidance to find the right method and practice consistently.
Ideating Ways to Transform the Challenges into Chances
Having identified the problems to focus on, we brainstormed potential solutions and how to visualize them.
With the provided features they can:
select a path that is matched their specific preferences and needs
begins their self-reflection practice with check-in questions to record their mood
see a result of their insights by an overview of their milestones and progress
get inspired by a daily affirmation
To conclude:
Our app helps mindful people to create a routine for self-reflection to develop a positive mindset. They get the support and guidance for different methods they need throughout the process of learning more about self-reflection.
They can select a path that is matched to their specific preferences and needs. When mindful user use our app, they begin with daily check-in questions to record their mood and gratitude. As a result of their insights, they get an overview of their milestones and progress.
By ensuring that these features are available, the mindful users will feel guided and supported while developing a routine for their self-reflection process.
Flowing Through the App
We created one user flow (the happy path).
Enhancing User Experience through Prototype Testing
We tested our concept with a lo-fi prototype with five potential users. The users really liked the idea, but some things needed iterations. For example, during the check-in questions users wished for more choices to set their mood and they would like to have the possibility to skip the questions. We solved these problems during the mid-fi.
Usability Testing and App Refinements
During the mid-fi phase, we conducted five usability tests to make sure users could easily navigate through our app and encounter no problems.
A few things were changed: for example, we added a text input field to enable journaling directly within the app instead of doing it analogously.
The like & share option on the instruction page of the method confused users. Our solution was to move the like button to the last page of the method, and remove the option to share.
Look & Feel
It is essential to analyze competitors, and brand personalities, and create mood boards before we are able to implement colors and typography into our hi-fi prototype.
- Visual Competitor Analysis
During the visual competitive analysis, we compared Reflectly, Reflection.App and Fabulous. Our first observation was that all apps had white backgrounds with colored highlights that matched their brand colors. While Reflectly and Reflection.App use purple as their primary color and have a minimalistic style, Fabulous looks very colorful and playful.
For our app, we want to focus on creating a calm and meditative environment with a dark background.
- Brand Attributes
Brand personalities are characteristics that reflect the company’s values. With providing guidance and support, our app encourages self-reflection to develop a positive mindset. We defined the following brand attributes:
Calm
Trustworthy
Inspirational
Supportive
Mindful
A moodboard was created to capture the Brand Attributes visually.
Designing for Serenity
Going from there we formed our style tile. Calm and dark colors create a relaxing atmosphere and set the user in the right mood for their self-reflection practice.
We tested the contrast between the colors and succeeded with a triple A.
Approving the look & feel
With our hi-fi wireframes ready, we conducted a desirability. The majority matched with our previously defined Look & Feel attributes
Hi-fi prototype
What’s next?
In the future, we would like to perform further testings and iterations. We see potential in integrating an interactive avatar to personalize even more the individual path and to motivate by providing information about specific benefits. As well we would like to implement additional content from well-known people and add the possibility to establish and track goals.
Thanks to my team Marie Schmidtsdorf.
