Overview

Background

HerWay is a highly reputable social network in Sweden, specifically designed for ambitious career women. The network is a successful organizer of numerous IRL events including company events, influencer events, speeches, health and training activities. In addition, HerWay facilitates member communication through social media channels like Facebook and Instagram. Also, HerWay offer valuable personal growth resources such as podcasts, articles, meditation on the company website, allowing users to access enriching content. As part of HerWay's strategic growth plan, the development of an innovative app platform is pursued.

Client: HerWay Ab

Time horizon: 3 weeks from December 2023 to January 2024.

My role: UX/UI designer covering research, goal definition, user flows, ideating, wireframing, visual design, prototyping and testing.

Team members:

Founder & CEO at HerWay

The challenge

Navigating the project presented a unique challenge: the existing app for the HerWay community was an off-the-shelf product, with a small number of users, making it a new venture for everyone involved. The task at hand was to create an app that would deliver an outstanding user experience regardless of the user count. It needed to stand on its own, ensuring a positive interaction from the very first user.

Moreover, HerWay's diverse content spread across various platforms, including podcasts, the brand website, and social media. The goal was to consolidate this content within the app, reshaping user behavior. To achieve this, we crafted a change management strategy to address user expectations, guide them through the transition, and implement changes at the right pace.

Lastly, considering the community's accustomed access to free content, we faced the challenge of introducing limitations through the app. To overcome this hurdle, we focused on presenting additional benefits, showcasing that the shift to the app meant embracing something better and more valuable for our community members.

Goals

Both long and short-term goals was outlined in the beginning of the project, to align focus on enhancing the user experience and achieving HerWay's business objectives. The primary aim for the platform was to facilitate better member-to-member interaction, uncover and address previously unmet user needs, and establish a single platform for the network's content. Beyond the direct benefits to users, HerWay identified an opportunity to introduce an additional revenue stream through app subscriptions and attract new members.

NSM & OKRs

The process

The work process implied following the design thinking process in a quite linear mode, with iteration on the mid and final wireframes based upon user tests.

Discovery

Interviews, Insights & Empathy mapping

During the discovery phase, I focused primarily on empathizing with our existing community members. I conducted ten in-depth interviews, exploring their past experiences and practices related to confidence. To ensure a comprehensive understanding, I also engaged in interviews with the internal HerWay team and consulted mental health experts. This thorough approach ensures a well-rounded perspective and positions us uniquely in the market

Benchmarking

To guarantee the delivery of a final product that offers a unique user experience with advantages not currently available in the market, and serves as an appealing alternative to established, award-winning mental health and personal growth products, a thorough benchmarking was conducted. This ensured key differentiators was identified and enabled a unique value proposition to be defined.

Define

Building on the insights gathered during the discovery phase, the collected data was used as a foundation to craft User Need Statements. This process led to the creation of Behavioral Archetypes, offering a breakthrough understanding of the personalities and needs within the HerWay community.

User Need Statements

Behavioural Archetypes

I opted for Behavioral Archetypes to define user types, a decision grounded in the discovery results revealing distinct behavioral categories. The findings highlighted that users might exhibit different behaviors within one category, and this complexity needed a comprehensive approach. Choosing Behavioral Archetypes allows the capture of this nuanced diversity effectively.

Design Value Proposition

Based on the discovery findings and leveraging HerWay's unique capabilities, we crafted a Design Value Proposition (DVP). The primary goal in developing the DVP was to ensure that our design process yielded a product with a competitive edge, capable of standing strong against established alternatives in the market. Simultaneously, the DVP showcased HerWay's distinctive offerings. Throughout the subsequent phases of our work process, the DVP served as our guiding star, directing our efforts and providing a framework for decision-making.

Ideate & Select features for an MVP

Moving forward, the next step involved generating potential solutions. We used "How Might We" (HMW) questions to brainstorm ideas around the identified User Need Statements. Building on the HMW insights, we conducted brain-writing sessions with the team to ideate key features. This collaborative effort resulted in a plethora of potential features. To streamline and prioritize, we performed a MoSCoW analysis, identifying the most critical ones essential for the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) launch in the market.

HMW

MoSCoW & MVP

Design, Prototype & Test

Having nailed down the features for our MVP, we kicked off multiple rounds of Crazy 8’s to spark creative ideas for the user interface. These brainstorming sessions paved the way for sketching, laying the foundation for medium-fidelity wireframe design. To validate our direction, we conducted a concept test with a select group of community members. Thereafter, a design system was crafted, drawing inspiration from a mood board provided by the HerWay team.

In the home stretch, the iterated medium-fidelity wireframes was transformed into high-fidelity counterparts and a fully functioning prototype. Testing the prototype with another community group allowed us to fine-tune and apply adjustments for the optimal user experience

User flows

Two user flow examples show casing the Give support and the Reflect flows, designed to make is as easy as possible to access and execute.

Medium Fidelity Wireframes

Design System

A simple yet scalable design system meeting the current product needs.

High fidelity design

Home Screen

Reflection

Inbox based Support Request

Practice, Listen, Watch, Read 

Private Community Inbox

Progress based Private Profile

Handover to client

The client delivery included user flows, high fidelity wireframes, a fully functioning prototype, and a design system as well as a medium term plan with features and functions prioritised for future versions.