Sumondo an app to monitor and relieve stress.

Improving user activation rate by integrating the app with users’ existing exercise routines.

Project Type: End-to-end app.

Role: Sole UX/UI designer, with support from Sumondo’s founder Vishal Sisodia.

Industry: Health

Tools: Figma, FigJam, Skype

Duration: Q4 2015 - Q1 2016

JUMP TO SECTION

  • Introduction

  • How might we integrate Sumondo with users’ daily routines?

  • An unexpected issue

  • The final solution

  • Where do we go from here?

Introduction

The users

Adults between 35-65 years old who are concerned that their deteriorating physical and mental health will impact their ability to live a more full life.

The product

Sumondo is a stress monitoring app for adults seeking to raise awareness and suggesting relieving methods by encouraging users to incorporate meditation and breathing exercises into their daily routine.

Not all stress has negative effect. Studies have shown that short term stress boosted the immune system, but chronic stress has a significant effect on the immune system that ultimately manifest an illness.

The business goal

We wanted to improve the user activation rate by making Sumondo a part of users’ daily routines.

How might we integrate Sumondo with users’ daily routines?

Making the most of users’ existing routines

User research found that most users had a habit of exercising or meditating to alleviate the symptoms of high stress levels. While exercising and meditating on their own is not enough for improving mental health, we wanted to encourage users to keep this existing routine. How might we integrate exercise/meditation with the Sumondo app?

The proposed solution

Notify users about reaching sustained levels of stress by suggesting activities such as breathing exercises, meditation breaks, walk trips, hydration breaks, and others. By creating a way for users to incorporate their existing routines in the app, we hope to make the app a regular part of their daily routine.

Breathing exercises system

3-minutes long breathing exercises were added to the app. Users can follow the Inhale and Exhale rhythm watching the animation on the screen.

Tracking activities and Quick Actions

I included cards showing actions performed thanks to the app’s suggestions along with Calm streak days achievements within the “insights” view.

I’ve added Quick actions to perform on the Home app view to easily register the most common activities.

Mobile phones showing screens from the mid-fi prototype: Home, Insights, List of Actions, and Settings.

View Mid-fi Prototype on Figma

An unexpected issue

What didn’t work?

Users wanted to choose the length of the breathing exercise.

  • The fixed 3 minutes long breathing exercise was too long for the majority of the users trying the activity.

Users found the “do not disturb” mode difficult to reach.

  • The button labeled “Do Not Disturb” in the settings panel was too hard to find for most users.

What did work?

  • Users completed the Action with ease.

  • Users were delighted by the progress animation shown on the Breathing Exercise.

  • The users were enthusiast about the visualisation of the stress trends and related statistics.

Helping users FIND the Input Exercise Form

Priority revisions

Since users didn’t have issues with performing Actions, I focused the solution ideas on making the Do Not Disturb button easier to find and creating a pop up to determine the breathing exercise’s length.

Pro

Idea 1: Replace the Pause button with a Do Not Disturb button.

Adding the button at the bottom of the app’s Home view makes it accessible and fast to reach. The button would prompt a screen to select the length of the Do not Disturb mode.

Con

Users would still need to access the app to stop the notifications.

Pro

Idea 2: Implement a Do not Disturb button in the notifications.

Users could stop the notifications from the notifications themselves which makes it the fastest way to interact with the Do not Disturb mode.

Con

There is limited ability to choose the length of the Do Not Disturb period, therefore forcing users to turn it off manually once the app is accessed. This could potentially lead users to forget about the aforementioned step and eventually making the app less useful.

The final solution

Plan: Improve user activation rates by finding opportunities to integrate the Sumondo app with users’ daily routines.

Research: Users had an existing daily stress relieving routines outside of the app.

Solution: Notify users when their stress levels reach specific thresholds and allow them to perform a stress relieving exercise.

Breathing exercise case

Giving the option to select the duration of the breathing exercise will enable users to customise their experience with Sumondo app.

Do Not Disturb Shortcut

Quick shortcut to disable notification available on the Home screen. Users can choose what time the notifications will automatically turn on again.

View the Mid-Fi Prototype

Where do we go from here?

Let’s see if the changes worked!

First, I would recommend conducting usability testing again with new participants. Have the changes made it easier for users to find the input exercise form?

If usability testing is not an option, I would recommend tracking the following metrics:

  • What percentage of users are performing on-app Actions? Are those users more engaged with our app overall?

  • How has the new feature impacted the user activation rate?

Other possible improvements

If the Breathing exercise is a hit

  • Are there ways to gamify the experience? Such as collecting points towards weekly challenges and other data which might encourage more the app usage on users’ phones.

  • Could we implement the existing reminders to help remind users to input their exercise information?

If the Breathing exercise form does not significantly impact the user activation rate, we may have to consider other solution option, such as improving the onboarding process.

What I learnt

Explaining design decisions through the lens of business goals.

I find it most natural to justify my design choices based on user insights, but I’m also learning to emphasise how those choices align with and support the company’s goals.