After LAUNCHING THE MVP, we learned that trainers wanted the ability to create group classes. As Rec co-founder and chief product officer, I led the effort to concept and ship this key feature in our app.

While the app served both trainers and clients, this case study focuses specifically on the trainer and class creation.

Team

Co-founders:
Christian Desrosiers
Charlie Himmelstein

Engineers:
Overseas team

Why group fitness?

We defined a group fitness class as one trainer leading a class with two or more people. We learned from research with both trainers and clients wanted this feature because:

1. It optimizes the hourly rate of instructor

2. It reduces the price to the attendee

3. It’s a fun social experience for everyone

Research

I audited several other apps that had creation components and event detail pages and reviewed our existing research. These findings and insights informed my next iterations of user flows and wireframing.

Simplifying the experience

We had previously learned that asking clients to download a new app was a barrier in our MVP.

For this next iteration, trainers would create a class within our app. Then, our app would then create a web page that trainers could share via social or messaging. Clients simply signed up on their web browser.

I created a user flow to define the required fields and interactions for group class creation.

Wireframes

I created preliminary wireframes to organize and create hierarchy for class detail inputs. I worked with my junior designer to conduct hallway tests using a low fidelity prototype of different configurations to tease out any unexpected outcomes.

Prototype

After finding the right configuration of class information, it was time to move to apply the UI and create prototype. To speed up delivery and ensure consistency, we also developed an inititial pattern library.

We shared the prototype and got the greenlight from investors.

User testing

To get unbiased feedback, we sought out 5 trainers who hadn't heard of Rec or knew of our mission.

Goals:

• Further understand their current practice of setting up a group classes

• See where our prototype is not working or confusing

• Find any unmet needs

Findings and improvements

✅ The flow was a good length

✅ The generated link included the correct information to share and advertise classes

🚫 Payments and notifications were not intuitive

🚫 The final interaction of sharing a class via social or messaging was not clear

Success screen

I added a success screen to the end of the class creation flow to ensure trainers shared the link to their class.

This also was a great place to give them details about payments, cancellations, and support.

Texts vs. emails vs. push notifications

Through testing we were able to get more clear on how users preferred to get information delivered to them. This helped us prioritize certain messages and add Twilio and Sendgrid integrations to the product roadmap.

The right date picker

A big learning and small fix, we noticed our users having a tough time properly choosing the correct date they wanted to hold their class.

Initially we had a date picker where the user picks the month and the numerical day. We moved to a picker that shows the day in context of the week and users were able to decrease the mental load on the user.

Handoff to dev

I finalized our design system document to simplify the handoff process. Breaking down component pieces down to their atoms and molecules allowed me to outline all use cases and identify edge cases.

Takeaways and next steps

A successful iteration
We experienced a decrease in tech support questions from our trainers. That freed us up to focus on next initiatives.

The group class feature moved the needle for trainers
Giving trainers the ability to create a group class and share the link allowed trainers to productize their offerings. New trainers started organically using our product. One trainer was able to grow his business from 4 to 40 monthly clients.

Onward to discovery
The products’s current form made it easy to onboard those who were familiar with us. As we continued to spread the word about our app a common piece of feedback from trainers was, “can you get me new clients?” That was a clear, but difficult target we set our eyes on next.