Fitness coaching tool for people that are new to technology

Empathize

This time I did some internet research and used the knowledge I had gathered from my patients when I worked as a physiotherapist. From stories I heard from my patients, I constructed a typical journey that the user would go through.

Define

Here are some problems that people may encounter when they're new both to the technology and the fitness world: too many options in the application lack of one straight path not enough information about exercises "surprises" during the training like additional equipment- extra exercise

Ideate

To visualize a path the user would have to go I created a user flow. Here it becomes clear how important is the simplicity of the app.

Prototype

As I didn't have much time, a lot to do and I was more skilled in Figma I skipped the paper wireframing phase and I created wireframes and a lof-fidelity prototype directly in the program. That allowed me to save some time that I spent later on doing more research. The most important screen of the app is the exercise screen. Each element of this screen responds to questions asked by users in a usability study.

Test

After I finished the prototype I tested it with 5 people in the age range of 70-76 years old. All of them started using their first smartphone no longer than 2 years ago. I have 3 insights from this test:

1. Users are concerned about their health, so I decided to give them access to experts' opinions about exercises. I added a possibility to connect and consult the app with the user's physiotherapist or doctor.
2. Users want to be able to edit their exercise sets so I created descriptions of exercises and equipment in the form of editable lists.
3. One of the wishes of people new to technology is to have someone who would guide them through the process. In the real world it's usually a coach or a physiotherapist so I figured out in my app there should be also someone like this. That's how I came up with Elisa. A virtual assistant and coach that tells you (through text and sound) exactly what to do.