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Fitbit
A Redesigned Mobile App to Mitigate Exercise Anxiety by Creating 4 Features.
Project
IUB HCI/d
Timeline
Feb - Mar 2023
Role
UI/UX Design
UX Research
Team
1 UI Designer
1 UX Researcher
Tool
Figma
FigJam
Overview
Overview
Fitbit is an American consumer electronics and fitness company. It produces wireless-enabled wearable technology physical fitness monitors and activity trackers. We redesign the Fitbit ecosystem focuses on the anxiety among 25-34 years old people when they go to the gym, and proposes a behavioral change strategy to overcome it. The goal is to help them cope with exercise anxiety.
What Is the Problem?
25-34 years old people with exercise anxiety struggle to reduce anxiety of working out in a public space.
How might we redesign the Fitbit mobile application to reduce anxiety of working out in a public space?
Solution
Introducing Redesigned Fitbit
We tackle the problem by connecting people to community groups.
Enabling an environment for users to share their concerns, connect with one another, and show the occupancy rate of indoor and outdoor environments, providing them with a facilitator of their healthy habits reducing exercise anxiety.
Feature 1
Fitness Tribe
Supportive Community for Shared Experiences & Growth
Provide a space to share experiences, challenges, and successes with like-minded individuals, fostering encouragement and feedback. This supportive environment helps reduce stress and anxiety, enhancing sense of belonging and overall well-being.
Feature 2
Workout Buddy
Connecting Users with Like-Minded Fitness Partners
Connect with users who share similar fitness goals, interests, and personalities. Working out with a buddy fosters a sense of community and belonging, especially for those who feel intimidated or overwhelmed in a gym setting.
Feature 3
Buddy Session
Real-Time Support & Interactive Workout Experience
Connecting with a workout partner in real-time via Bluetooth can increase motivation and accountability, leading to better overall fitness outcomes.
Feature 4
Occupancy
Plan Your Workouts with Real-Time Gym Capacity Insights
Users can easily determine the busyness level of nearby gyms and identify the times when the gym is less crowded. This allows them to plan their workouts accordingly and enjoy a stress-free gym experience.
What Led Us to Identify the Problem?
The 25-34 age group represents the largest segment of Fitbit users, accounting for 25.93%.
Research
Comprehensive Research
Primary Research
We aim to identify users' current exercise regimes, challenges and motivations, and if they make use of technology for maintaining their physical fitness.
Conducted semi-structured interviews with 5 participants, aged 25-34 years old, who used either a Fitbit watch or another fitness watch.
4 out of 5 participants experience anxiety about going to the gym due to the presence of many people.
Fear of embarrassment and judgment from others is a common concern.
4 out of 5 participants feel intimidated by more skilled individuals at the gym.
Secondary Research
Based on the insights we gained from primary research, we completed secondary research around the topic of ‘Exercise anxiety’ to validate our findings.
We obtained qualitative data that validated our primary research findings based on exercise anxiety and social accountability (Mason, J. E. et. al, 2019).
14 out of 16 people interviewed experiencing exercise anxiety.
Research Synthesis
We applied affinity mapping to interpret the interviews we performed and combine the results of our secondary research to determine a path for phrasing our problem statement.
Research Insights
We identified three key statistics indicating that exercise anxiety is a core problem for young adults and that support is needed during exercise through primary and secondary research.
60%
of our users expressed experiencing anxiousness in going to the
gym for their workouts.
80%
of our users said that they liked to share their progress with friends
and family, which increases their motivation.
14
out of 16 participants in a study conducted mentioned that they have ‘exercise anxiety’ and feel better if there is a social support for exercise (Mason, J. E. et. al, 2019)
How Did Insights Assist Us in Aligning Solutions with the Problem statement?
Design
Design
Persona
Our design process led us to create 2 personas that reflected the current themes that stood out from our affinity mapping, and I created 2 personas below.
Social anxiety
A person who struggles with social anxiety when it comes to working out in public spaces. He is motivated to stay fit and healthy but feels self-conscious about exercising in front of others.
Social accountability
A person who values physical fitness but struggles with finding the motivation to work out alone. She enjoys the social aspect of exercise and prefers to exercise with others or share his progress with friends and family.
Storyboarding
Based on our concept formation, I constructed storyboards to communicate the concepts in a visual representation, showing the user behavior change.
An user using the occupancy feature
An user finding a fitness buddy
User Flow
I created a user flow in order to understand the path that users take as they interact with a product or service, visually representing the steps that users take to complete a task within a product.
Low-fidelity Prototype
We created several low-fidelity screens to visualize and demonstrate the features that cater to our target audience. The image below displays three concepts, which include community group, finding workout buddies, and occupancy.
Testing and Insights
We gathered feedback by conducting usability testing with 3 participants on the three primary flows of our low-fidelity prototypes with three participants. We used a combination of observation and interviews to collect their insights.
The given feedback on three main flows of our redesign, which were then iterated upon to create high-fidelity prototypes.
Iteration
Iteration
We modified the options to our questions as per user feedback, and unified the flow of asking questions based on ‘finding your tribe’ and ‘setting goals.
Before
Flow 1: Find your tribe questionnaire
Flow 2: Setting goals questionnaire
+
We changed our user flow to a unified flow where user can find their fitness tribe and then find workout buddies from the groups that they join.
After
One questionnaire flow for finding tribe and setting goals
Before
Flow 3: Explore community group
Flow 4: Notification for finding workout buddy
After
Pin "Find Your Tribe" at the top of the homepage, showcasing success rate statistics, and reorganize the information hierarchy
+
Outcome
Outcome
Impact and Future Scope
58%
of SUS score
indicating that the System Usability Scale falls within the 'OK' to 'Good' range.
1.
Adding interactive elements like shared workout goals and progress tracking.
2.
Encouraging healthy competition through challenges and leaderboards.
3.
Providing support for exercise anxiety through trained professionals.
4.
Offering customized guided sessions based on individual fitness goals and preferences.
Learnings
Being a user myself, shifting from user myself to taking on a designer role wasn't easy. I had to consciously put aside any biases from my own experiences with wearables and apps, especially when dealing with a bit of gym anxiety. So, it is important to tackle the biases head-on to approach the design process with a clear and objective mindset.
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