The owner's idea was to combine a fitness tracker, a coupon application, and a social network and introduce it to the Chicago community. The first version was developed by another team and underwent the first testing at a local university. After that, the project was sent off to Rocketech for improvements.
We were up to remaster the legacy code and redesign the frontend for a more comfortable and personalized user experience.
Our #1 task was to redesign the app to meet the high standards of the health and fitness tech market. Sports are all about discipline, so we strived to create an effective UI that will make keeping fit easier.
The Project Steps users can access all the functionality from the home screen — a control center of the app. From there, they can see daily stats for steps, miles, and burned calories and access other sections of the app: detailed stats, the leaderboard, merchants, and coupons. This solution helped us provide tons of personalized information, yet not to overload the app with unnecessary data.
At the end of this stage, we improved the project's visual style, changed the interface of the screens, and significantly expanded the product compared to the previous team's MVP.
The next massive scope of work was dedicated to the admin panel. Our team developed a complex statistics functionality to help the owners manage and improve the product.
The statistics section of the admin panel provides detailed stats on user behavior: how often people use the app, preferred log-in and payment methods, conversion rate, click statistics, the click-merchant ratio, top merchants, socio-demographics, etc.
Project Steps synchronizes with Apple Health Kit on the user's phone, giving an accurate measure of steps. After that, a unique algorithm translates activity logs into representative stats, and then into the in-app points.
For more personalized recommendations, the user is asked to specify their personal data (gender, age, height, weight) and choose a fitness mode: Healthy lifestyle or Weight loss. The app uses this data to calculate an optimal physical activity plan — like a pocket coach who gives you discounts for a good workout.
The stats can be used to review daily, weekly, and monthly progress and set fitness goals. The data is segmented by time frames and 4 metrics: steps, miles, burned calories, and minutes of physical activity.
Project Steps partners up with multiple local businesses, such as fitness centers, healthy stores, and restaurants.
Users can exchange points for rewards of two types:
Coupons — granted for products in stores and cafes, such as food and supplements. To activate a coupon, the user must select the desired merchant in the Coupon tab and press Redeem. After that, they will receive a unique code that they should show to the salesperson or a waiter.
Cashback — granted for services such as sessions with personal trainers. To activate the cashback, the user has to take a picture of the receipt and send it for verification. Cashback is normally credited within 12 hours.
The rewards show up in the Coupon tab as the user gains enough points to unlock new offers.
The Leaderboard displays the most active members and calls the user to compete against friends, neighbors, or the entire Project Steps community of Chicago. The top users are in for freebies: free personal trainer sessions, smoothies, etc.
One can also filter the leaders by metrics (steps, miles, or burned calories) or time frames: today, weekly, and monthly.
In case the user would like to keep their achievements private, they can disable public visibility in the profile settings.
The social networking functionality of Project Steps comprises the Friends feed. Users can send and accept friends requests and share their fitness activities with a bunch of close people.
It's possible to register via email or sign up with Facebook, Google, or Apple ID accounts.
We were looking to revamp our application. We had worked with another developer, and the quality was poor. We found a few companies on Clutch, and felt this team had the best proposal within our budget.
They restructured the frontend design of the app, and added functionality. They changed the look, and the signup process. One of the features they added was the ability for users to add friends and compare stats. The logistics and look of the design were the main focus for changes. They changed the coding from PHP to a very complex, more modern coding language. They also developed a backend portal that allows us to analyze the users.
They're very coherent and transparent in what they do. It is a good working relationship. They work in an Agile environment. They do a good job of including the client in their process and go through reviews. Communication has been pretty good.