Uforia business management

A redesign for sign-ups, business metrics, and the instructor scheduler
My roles: UX Designer, UX Researcher
Tools: Sketch, Invision, Protopie
Project Overview
Uforia Studios is a fitness studio chain in San Francisco that offers three distinct classes to keep the workouts diverse and fun, for example: spin, core strengthening, and Hip Hop dance.
Although it is a boutique fitness environment, they offer more affordable classes ($15-$20) and cater mostly towards younger working women and students (ages 18-35).
A few hindering problems for Uforia was its reliance on 3rd party companies to facilitate class purchasing and registration, and instructor scheduling. This 3rd party company was called mind body which is a one size fits all type platform that companies subscribe to in order to facilitate most of the company's and clients' needs. It was fairly inexpensive, but the UI feels and operates very heavy since it has to be customizable to any studio. Additionally, the aesthetics were all shades of grey which did not align with Uforia's bold purple and pinks. Lastly, front desk workers and studio managers were frequently annoyed by the amount of bugs encountered, and clunky interface were always wishing for a better solution. The demand for a new solution was the impetus for this project.

Objectives:
1) Construct a business management app highly personalized to the needs and demands of Uforia front desk works and managers
2) Accelerate front desk workers check-in process
3) Eliminate missed in-studio sales during peak attendance hours
4) Increase business insights through more granular business metrics
5) Accelerate instructor scheduling process
My Contributions
UX Research
I examined the strengths and weaknesses of their current management software, Mindbody and then compared it with other business management apps to learn from their success and failures. Additionally, I spoke with Uforia front desk workers and managers who frequently use the Mindbody website to learn what problems they encountered, and identifying opportunities I should explore. I then made a list of the most painful and frequent problems to give my overall design process structure and direction.

UX Design
Using what I had learned from other management websites during the research phase enable me to build this one into a highly personalized experience for Uforia employees. Incorporating the Uforia brand and values were also considered to make the online experience consistent with the in-studio experience. Since Uforia already had a pretty successful marketing scheme in place I chose to use a number of icons and images that were already being used on their website to form part of the design language of this app. My process in a nutshell was hitting a few design goals each week, then upload it to Invision, and present it to a couple desk workers, clients, or managers depending on who it was most relevant to, and iterate based on the feedback.

My Process

Research

Conduct internal interviews to learn from colleagues. Then conduct external interviews with customers
What is the problem?
What is the context in which they experience this problem?
How painful is it? 0-4
How frequent is it? 0-4
What are their goals?
What persona mostly experiences it?

Analyze

Prioritize problems by pain total
(Intensity + frequency = pain total)
(If applicable) Identify user flows or mouse movements that could be more efficient in the existing UIs
Will solving this problem create another problem?
How would solving this problem reinforce my working unit’s strategy and the company’s brand?
What is the context in which they experience this problem?
List or review with product owner the initial acceptance criteria

Prototype

Build mid-fidelity mockups to allow for the collection of more detailed feedback while also keeping the time-to-test low
Include zero/default states of user flows
Include likely error handling states
Consider and include if possible “solutions” to likely edge cases that may arise

Test

Usability test with internal stakeholders, make corrections, then test with customers
For any unexpected user behavior, take note and ask what the user was thinking during those moments
Ask open ended questions to keep the dialogue flowing in order to increase the chances of collecting key information.For example:
How did it feel becoming familiar with the app/website?How do you think it could be improved?
Key metrics of performance: Number of miss clicks, and task duration.
UX Research
Jun 2016 — Jul 2017
Since I was already taking classes at the studio for several months I was already familiar with the company's philosophy in how they aim to create an effective and fun workout. Their business management tool, Mindbody, did not reinforce any of their values, nor did it feature a user journey similar to the in studio one. The bottom line is that there was almost no continuity. Speaking with desk workers, manages, instructors, and clients revealed many kinds of frustrations on their part. I would simply ask them if there was anything frustrating about the app and assembled a list prioritized by frequency and pain levels.
To be able to build a list of paint points and opportunities I interviewed several front desk workers and their manager. I simply asked them to tell me about their experience using Mindbody and how it was helping them or not helping them accomplish their goals.
As they were describing their experience I wrote down several problems they mentioned and after they were done speaking I asked them to rate the pain painfulness and frequency of each problem.
Painfulness 0-4: 0 (No Pain) - 4 (Unbearable)
Frequency 0-4: 0 (Never) - 4 (Constant)

Problems and Pain
1) Missing a water bottle sale because the platform doesn't have an efficient way to record transactions to charge later after peak attendance hours.
Painfulness: 3 (Very Painful)
Frequency: 3 (Often)
Painfulness Total: 6/8

2) Check-in process is slow. Accessing class information to answer client questions takes about 15-20 seconds per questions because of information is behind multiple button presses.
Painfulness: 1 (Annoying)
Frequency: 3 (Often)
Painfulness Total: 4/8

3) Scheduling process is slow and grueling. Assembling and viewing the schedule doesn't give clear vision. No photos to help learn and recall instructors' names and faces while scheduling.
Painfulness: 2 (Frustrating)
Frequency: 3 (Often)
Painfulness Total: 5/8

4) Understanding business performance feels scattered and slightly vague. Insight into sales of a particular item and comparing class capacities could be more clear.
Painfulness: 2 (Frustrating)
Frequency: 2 (Sometimes)
Painfulness Total: 4/8

Since I was already taking classes at the studio for several months I was already familiar with the company's philosophy in how they aim to create an effective and fun workout. Their business management tool, Mindbody, did not reinforce any of their values, nor did it feature a user journey similar to the in studio one. The bottom line is that there was almost no continuity. Speaking with desk workers, manages, instructors, and clients revealed many kinds of frustrations on their part. I would simply ask them if there was anything frustrating about the app and assembled a list prioritized by frequency and pain levels.
They also gave me a few possible solutions to the issues they were experiencing.
To search for more areas of opportunity to improve I turned to other management websites. I watched videos and downloaded several and look to see how they organized features and what steps they take users through. I essentially took the most straight forward and useful elements from these and MindBody to form a list of opportunities I can pursue. Additionally, I looked at the Uforia brand and studio layouts. I took colors and icons from the Uforia website, and explored a couple to studios to capture what the in-studio experience was like before, during, and after class. What textures, patterns, and colors were most prominent? The answers to the questions, thankfully, came fairly easily was implemented into the designs you see below.
Class screen changes
Check-in changes
Mindbody Business analytics
1) No capacity utilization metric
2) No retention percentages
3) No line graphs for forecasting
More one sized fits all business metrics. About half the metrics on this screen are irrelevant to Uforia managers
~Business analytics design~
6-7 step scheduling process is unnecessary for Uforia management
~Scheduler design~ After time slots have been made available instructors can be quickly scheduled or changed
Conclusion
The final leg of this project was both a success and a failure. After running through numerous iterations rounds I believed I had arrived at a strong enough prototype to present to the company CEO. I had received positive feedback from managers, clients, and front desk workers who had seen and tested the prototype, so I was feeling pretty good! Following my presentation with the CEO who was really impressed, she disclosed to me that it would not be possible to finance such a project because they were just about to announce the opening of a new studio next month. Although she said she liked it, their current app does work though with minimal approval from nearly everyone I spoke with. Going into this project I knew there was a low likelihood of my prototype getting implemented but I still wanted to go through with it since I really appreciated the kind of product the Uforia staff was putting out. Who knows I may get a call in a few years to work with their developers.
Other Projects
How I prevented a cannabis business from entering a high-risk, brick and mortar situation
Cannabis store and education website

Impact:
Drove the business towards online direct to consumer instead of a brick and mortar sales outlet.
5 of 5 usability testers would recommend
Web - B2C
How I helped reduce technical support emails and calls to a marketing solutions company by making product user flows "as tailored and flexible as a glove"
Data Product Platform

Impact:
Reduced help emails and calls to customer service and technical support during several product configuration steps
Web - B2B
How I increased the confidence of high school students regarding their career futures through guided self-learning and self-discovery
Guided self-learning for highschoolers

Impact:
Dozens of students now have three different ideal careers to pursue, and on a scale of 0-4, 1.2 points higher level of confidence in their career future after taking the course
Web - B2C