UX Research- 2022
Project Overview: Nessle is a digital health app where parents can connect with experts around the world for tailored support. Nessle struggled to establish user trust in their platform, hindering payment for experts’ services.
My team worked together to find solutions to this issue. After extensive research and working with a data analyst, we designed multiple approaches to the problem at hand.
Role & Duration of Project: This was an academic project for the Product Innovation certificate through the da Vinci Center at Virginia Commonwealth University. My team was made up of students from cross-disciplinary backgrounds. My role as the team lead was designing the prototypes of our solutions and being in charge of scheduling and communication. This project spanned a semester, approximately four months.
Problem statement: Nessle needs to build credibility, connection, security, and engagement so that potential users can see the value in paying for their services.
Design Process: We began by conducting user interviews to get a better idea of who Nessle’s target audience is and what they need from this type of platform. Using feedback from the interviews, we were able to create three groups of personas including pre-pregnancy (9 months prior/trying to conceive), pregnancy (9 months during pregnancy), and post-pregnancy (9 months after pregnancy).
Secondary Research: Along with the findings from the user interviews, the team worked to research what trust looks like in an online setting. Understanding this broad term of trust was the key to finding solutions for Nessle. We identified the factors of online trust and looked at how similar platforms are effectively creating a sense of trust with their clients using a competitive analysis.
Social Analysis: We hired a social listening analyst to analyze online conversations to gain insights from customer feedback and industry trends to help us better understand what our personas need from this type of space.
General Trends Found:
Need for peer support and recognition
Parents don’t want to make decisions alone
Top Topics Found:
Parents enjoy sharing “First Time” moments and unique experiences
Drawn to birth month groups as a way to create sub-communities and follow others on the same journey
Insights Found:
Subtle engagement is valued when building trust within the community and platform (likes, endorsements, more transparency in profile)
As parents progress through parenthood, the need for specialized expertise increases
Pay Per Use Models and Light Registration Models:
It was concluded that when customers are required to pay for services of any kind, there needs to be a strong sense of trust
Companies do this by offering a sneak peek into their services by using a Pay Per Use (PPU) Model or allowing their customers to try a light registration model of their services
Some models below use these models and they are very effective in allowing their users to get a feel for their services without fully committing to them
We then used these findings to design solutions for each of the personas that we created
Light Registration Model & Forum Feature:
The pre-pregnancy persona is the group least likely to subscribe due to the uncertainty of conception. Their pain points were having access without commitment and the need for community and anonymity. The light registration model would allow users to preview what the platform offers without the commitment of paying immediately. The forum feature would give these users the option to remain anonymous while still being able to participate in the community and see engagement.
Badge Feature & Birth Month Organizing Feature:
The pregnancy persona is the group that potentially forms the majority of the active community. This group’s pain points are that they value credible advice (proof of credibility) and desire the ability to organize by birth month. The feature we created for this persona to address their pain points was implementing the badge feature. This would allow users to see endorsed responses and engagements while forming an initial trustworthy environment. The badges we designed range from verification status, expertise, education, and HIPPA compliance. The birth month organizing feature within the forum would allow users to join others who are going through the same journey as them.
Level of Urgency Feature & Expert Profile Improvements:
The post-pregnancy persona group are made up of new and seasoned parents. They are infrequent users likely to enjoy supporting others along their journeys. Their pain points included the need for timely responses in urgent situations and they prefer verified experts and information with visible followings. The feature we created for this persona was implementing the level of urgency feature that prioritizes urgent questions so that experts can help in urgent cases. This feature would make users feel that their needs are prioritized. Our expert profile improvement suggestions, such as a basic outline of a primary portion (credentials, certifications, stage of parenting, price range for services) and secondary portion (interests, profession, education, family, etc) of their bios create more cohesive expert profiles, inspiring trust and credibility. Other suggestions for expert profiles were adding standards for organized expert profiles (cohesive headshots, name formatting, bio word count, etc), including user reviews for other users to look at, using a star rating, and linking their blog directly from their profile. These suggestions allow users to view the experts at full transparency which in the end will inspire trust, and hopefully encourage subscription to the platform.
Results: One of the outcomes from our research/ recommendations was that Nessle took our suggestion on the implementation of a free (light) vs premium model. This feature would allow users to get a sense of community/engagement without having to pay any money right away. Nessle also fixed all their expert profiles following the guidelines that we suggested to inspire trust and credibility in the users. Nessle implemented the badges feature we designed so that users could see endorsed responses and engagements while forming an initial trustworthy environment.