Mat is a mobile app that helps people who want to practice yoga find the teachers or studios that are a good fit for them
Concept
UX
UI
User Research
Prototyping
Branding
Three years ago, as a true couch potato I decided it’s about time I start being active. I decided to practice yoga.
Finding a place to practice was more difficult than I expected. I looked for information online, and found partial information about prices, schedules, teachers, or types of yoga… I turned to Facebook groups and friends for recommendations, but the information there was also confusing…
I found myself abandoning the search again and again.
The problem:
Finding a place to practice yoga and sustain a healthy, stress-free lifestyle.
The solution:
Creating a platform that will connect people who want to practice yoga with the teachers or studios that are a good fit for them, so they can persist practicing yoga, live a healthier, stress-free life and avoid illnesses caused by pressure.
Will Sarah be a good fit for the user?
To address the significant pain point of finding the right teacher, it was important for me to build a teacher profile page that would allow access to content that may interest practitioners at all levels.
Mat allows users to book a yoga class via the app. The user can buy credit in the app and pay any yoga class or studio with that credit, no strings attached.
There Must Be a Solution Out There! Before diving in, I conducted a thorough market analysis to make sure that I haven’t missed any existing solution to this problem.
I found two platforms featuring an easy and intuitive search, booking, and payment for fitness classes, including yoga (ClassPass and Mindbody). However, those platforms were not yoga-oriented. They didn’t offer needed information regarding teachers or genre. I found a third platform that was dedicated to the yoga world, but it lacked booking or payment features (YogaTrail).
To understand what does Lauren wants to achieve and way, I used the JTBD methodology. I learned that Lauren has a lot of pressure and stress managing her own business. She is looking to improve her quality of life and reduce stress by engaging in physical activity to give her some balance – both mentally and physically.
key insight: the main problem that makes Lauren abandon the search appears when she comes across partial information.
This is Lauren’s journey:
I also designed Mat's logo ✍️
Mat is here to help you find all the information you need to practice yoga and keep a healthy, active and calm lifestyle.
Spend less time searching and more time on the yoga mat.
Apart from the sign-up process, I chose to address two brief issues that could help Mat personalize the content for the user.
No worries – this can be changed at any time in the user’s profile.
This is the place the user can see tailored offers for him or her and explore the yoga opportunities nearby. The user can also stay up to date with friends’ activities in the yoga world and read articles in the yoga magazine that contains tips and recommendations.
The “Find” section of the app offers a location-based search for a yoga teacher, class or studio. The user can filter the results and tailor them by his or her preference. The filters can address the needs of the users who know exactly what they want.
The user can divide the screen between the search results and the map view.
To complete the task of finding a place to practice and actually start doing it – Mat allows the user to book and pay for the lesson through the app. The user is not obliged to subscribe to a particular studio and can attend various yoga classes in his or her area or even elsewhere, like when on vacations or business trips.
Mat’s model also allows users to make payments through the app. The user pays money to claim a credit called “Mat credit.” For any charge over $40, the user gets 5% extra credit.
In the calendar section, the user can see upcoming classes and manage his or her bookings.
The next step in this project is conducting usability testing to refine and validate the solution.
In order to give the user a complete experience, I would like to design a web platform. As recent studies show, mobile usage is in a constant growth. With that said, in 2018, 42% of web visits in the U.S were made from a desktop, and the total time users spent on sites when using desktop devices was still larger than the total time for mobile (58% via desktop). Mat’s users can find it useful to access the platform via desktop, especially for teacher or lesson searches.
Yoga retreats are a withdrawal from the daily routine to instead focus on the practice of yoga. Usually, it includes a stay at a peaceful and calm place or resort offering yoga activities for a few days.
I think it is worth considering offer information about and booking for yoga retreats via Mat to users. This requires further research into the scope of our users who may use it.
Yoga has become increasingly popular in the Western world, mostly as a physical health practice, but also for stress reduction and general wellness. Finding a place to practice yoga can be an easy and friendly process. Moreover, It was important to me to not end the process there, but also to meet the need to book the class and pay for it without being tied to a particular studio..
When working on this project, I had multiple directions. The constant feedback I got was very important, helped me understand which direction is better to take regarding this project and of course deeply affected the end result.
In addition, I had the opportunity to try out the prototyping tool – ProtoPie, which was great and allowed me to articulate and present my design and micro-interactions.
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