OurHerd
Mobile app uplift and
innovation of new
features
Overview
Client
My Role
Duration
Sector
Batyr
UX/UI Designer
2.5 week sprint
Social Impact, Mental Health, Youth
OurHerd is a mobile app that allows you to view, create and share stories about navigating tough times.
It is currently in the pre-launch phase and Batyr has plans for the future of the app but would like to have different ideas on their app advancements. This is where we came in, tasked to deliver a presentation about the design solutions for the story creation process and holistic wellbeing side of OurHerd.
From research to ideation, prototypes, usability testings and future project goals, we were delivered a comprehensive presentation to Batyr for OurHerd design possibilities.
Being involved throughout the entire design process from the start, my roles have also included designing some key screens in the holistic wellbeing side, helping implement aesthetic elements and making sure of design consistencies throughout the app.
Project Table of Contents
1. Two problems we needed to address
Story Creation
Young Australians with mental health concerns feel apprehensive about sharing their story with others and need to feel confident and supported but are worried about stigma and judgement.
Holistic Wellness
Young Australians feel confused about how best to look after their mental health and need information and support but don't know where to easily access this information.
1.1. What does it actually mean?
To understand more about the mental health and wellbeing topic, OurHerd competitors, and main user demographics, we did research, conducted surveys and interviews with these goals in mind around the following topics:
Sharing stories about tough times
What were the primary concerns, stigma/barriers, and reasons why they shared their story?
Where did they share their story?
Research results
Support networks
Which networks and what did people use to reach out for help?
How were they feeling supported or how did they provide support for others?
Holistic wellness
Were any tracking devices/apps used to monitor health and wellbeing?
What did they think helps with their mental wellbeing?
From the 39 surveys completed by those aged between 16-30, and a total of 19 one-to-one interviews conducted, these were are some of the insights:
95%
WILL REACH OUT TO FRIENDS FOR SUPPORT
3 IN 4
USE INSTAGRAM THE MOST
87%
DON'T SHARE VULNERABLE STORIES ONLINE
1 IN 2
ARE CONTENT CREATORS
51%
TRACK EXERCISE, SLEEP OR NUTRITION THROUGH TECHNOLOGY
Quotes
" Sometimes seeing what others have to say on the internet about having a similar experience can help to see how they overcame certain things. "
" Most of my stress is alleviated by vocalising my issue or getting reassurance that it’s not irrational. "
" Hard to find a non-judgemental community. "
2. Building empathy
Using the quantitative and qualitative data from the researches, surveys and interviews, we further segmented the main user groups into three different personas and their customer journey experiences. This was a necessary step to better empathise with them when moving forward with the project, helping us prioritise their goals and needs.
Meet the personas:
Nina Appali, 22
Self-conscious altruist
Sam Anderson, 19
Overwhelmed high achiever
Zoe McGregor, 19
Supportive friend
There were two different journeys for the two different objectives.
One involving Nina in her experience with the story creation aspect of OurHerd.
The other one was about the holistic wellbeing aspect, showing Sam and his need for change after a helpful prompt from Zoe.
3. Focusing project direction
These two How Might We questions were used to further define the project goals for Nina and Sam.
STORY CREATION
How might we provide a seamless and engaging story creation process for Nina to share her mental health journey, so that we reduce stigma around conversations of mental health and the fear of being judged?
LIFESTYLE BALANCE
How might we help Sam become more aware of his habits and lifestyle and encourage him to work towards and track
his progress towards his own set goals using existing technology?
3.1. Ideation workshop with stakeholders
From these areas of focus to concentrate on, we hosted co-design workshop with Batyr to ideate possible design solutions.
Crazy 8's super idea mash up
Co-design workshop with
Batyr on Zoom
Minimum Viable Product map
Co-design Workshop
with Batyr
4. Design time!
We took those ideas and started our designs after working out a user flow.
Here are some of the first lo-fi wireframes.
Lo-fi wireframes of Story Creation (left) and Holistic Wellbeing (right)
4.1. Realisation strikes. Back to the drawing board...
Unfortunately (or fortunately realised very quickly) after the first round of usability testing we found that we had inadvertently feature-creeped. Our designs had led the app to encompass too many features that were not implemented well enough, thus causing a lot of confusion about what the main purpose of the app was. At this stage, we had lost sight of our main personas, the Ninas and Sams.
With that realisation, we went back to focus properly on the story creation and lifestyle balance aspects that were the main considerations for the Ninas and Sams. We stripped back to these basics for what would the main features be for OurHerd app.
Here are some of the subsequent wireframe designs that came out after the next round of refinements and usability testings results.
Mid-fi wireframes of Story Creation (left) and Holistic Wellbeing (right)
I thoroughly enjoyed putting the colours back into the designs and choosing the illustrations to use throughout the app.
I was also heavily involved in combing through copy text for any spelling errors, different use of terms, design and layout discrepancies.
Some of the main changes throughout the design iterations were to copy text as mental health is a sensitive area which needs a lot of empathic rapport for. One example of copy text changes was to the term 'challenges', there were some strong dislikes for that term and so we changed them to ‘goals’. With a simple but effective change from 'challenges' to the term 'goals', it lessened the apprehensive feeling for users when trialed during usability testings.
5. OurHerd prototype main features
Storytelling features:
On-boarding introduction, Story creation, Support and interactions, Visibility settings
OurHerd main features - Storytelling
Holistic Wellbeing features:
Goal programs, Mood check-in and tracker, Resource hub, Meditation activities
OurHerd main features - Holistic Wellbeing
5.1. Results
The OurHerd app designs was an overall success. From an initial overwhelming confusion about what the app was going to be in the first design iteration, we have turned it around to have 88% approval rating (7/8 testers) for the screens making them feel that they can share their stories in a safe and welcoming environment. In the holistic wellbeing sections, 72% (5/7 testers) would most likely engage in ‘goals’ to improve wellbeing.
Jocé, 23
Enjoyed the illustrations a lot, heartwarming.
Sarah, 22
I like the fact that customisation of goals and activities is allowed and record tracking is available. Also challenges require only a small fragment of time, making goals more likely to accomplish.
Jess, 26
Having topics to choose via the tiles helped figure out what the goal is.
6. Future steps
For the future steps, we created this roadmap for the year. It is broken down into features for easier categorisation.
There was ally/support/community and gamification features that we would have loved to implement in the app as the data shows those were favourably desired, but due to time constraints we weren’t able to concentrate on them.
Due to that desirability from user groups, we have put them as considerations in the roadmap in the 'Other' categories.
7. In conclusion and reflections
It was delightful working with Batyr and my team members in this fast-paced 2.5 week design sprint.
Batyr was very happy with the project and presentation, giving us plenty of lovely feedback:
“Really well structured presentation, so much thinking and hard work with lots of helpful ideas and well developed suggestions. I can definitely see us implementing quite a few of the items presented!”
The main challenges faced in this project was when we realised that we had strayed from our main persona groups’ needs. It was a scary thought to think that if we didn’t realise it early on, it would have led to the design solutions not being received well and wasting a lot of time and effort to fix something that is truly broken. Test often and frequently to remove bias, also it’s a good check point to see if designs is aligning with the main goals.
So in hindsight, if we have checked more frequently back with our Ninas and Sams, we wouldn’t have got to that situation. It was a big reminder to keep the main personas at the forefront of every design process going forward!
Thanks for viewing!
Illustrations in this case study by Pixeltrue