Get uplifted each day with words from others
Industry
Health
Client
Jobtimistic
Introductie
An app where people collect short, honest appreciations from friends, so users are reminded daily of kind words and naturally build confidence from what others see in them.
Over the course of two months, my role in the project was to explore opportunities to improve the product using proven UX patterns. I also made a visual redesign of the app and web application.
Problem
Upliftful wants to help people receive positive words from friends in an accessible way, but many people find it difficult to ask for appreciation. The existing app had high cognitive load and little visual hierarchy. The assignment was to simplify the experience, lower barriers, and create a clear, mature design.
From audit to redesign
After the initial conversations, I conducted a UX audit to map out barriers in the current app and opportunities in UX principles. Based on that, I created a new UI design and revised the visual style.
Throughout the process, I had weekly meetings to align design choices and check technical feasibility. We iteratively worked towards a viable and fitting design.
Designing for Warmth & Simplicity
How do we design a Daily Uplift as an effective trigger that naturally encourages users to regularly return to their Uplifts?
How do we motivate users to naturally invite more friends?
How do you bring calm, simplicity, and clarity to the interface, so the app feels personal and warm without visual noise?
How do we add a revenue model without limiting the core experience?
The redesign
The project started with a slide deck where I presented my findings and improvement points from the UX audit. Based on that, I redesigned the key parts of the app:
Mobile app
An invitation flow that makes it easy for users to ask friends for an uplift.
A Daily Uplifts screen where users see their appreciations. Both daily and a full view.
An onboarding that explains step by step how Upliftful works.
A complete redesign of the app's visual style.
Illustrations for onboarding and empty states.
Web application
An onboarding that explains what Upliftful is and how users can show appreciation for their friends.
A simple interface where people can fill in uplifts for the user.
A landing page that invites you to use Upliftful for yourself.
Key takeaways
The UX audit approach for a redesign worked really well. It gives you a strategy for your design and leads to valuable insights and conversations that only improved the design.
While designing I initially focused a lot on showing Uplifts, but it's even more important how the user will see the app when they don't have any uplifts yet. This way, we also create a good user experience for new users. Actually, even more important.