What is the problem?
How can we make the rock-climbing experience in the gym easier and more exciting?
What is the solution?
Create an app that will help users to navigate the gym, track their climbing process, and create a community of like-minded people.
Tools
Figma
Illustrator
Photoshop
Skills
UX Research
UX/UI Design
Information design
Branding
Team
Solo
Timeline
09.2021 - 04.2022
or 28 weeks
Users and audience
Overall audience: rock climbing gym users, from 16 to 45. The App should serve the needs of a specific gym, namely Stone Gardens at Bellevue. People who are climbing here are of different ages and genders.
There are 3 main categories of users:
- Teen teams with kids who are learning how to climb and preparing for competitions
- Climbers, who climb regularly. They have a membership and go to the gym 1-3 times a week
- New climbers/day visitors. People, who just want to try new activities or athletes who usually climb in other gyms
Why I decided to concentrate on the second group of users:
- They bring maximum profit to the gym revenue
- As a regular gym users, they would probably use the App most frequently
- These users create an inclusive atmosphere in the whole gym and make it more attractive for potential new users
Primary audience
Members of the gym
Secondary audience
New climbers and day visitors
Design thinking process
Emphasize, Define
Interview. Understanding current users
Firstly, I needed to understand the general pain points of climbers and their basic behavior model during climbing. I observed climbers in a gym and also interviewed multiple Stone Gardens users with the following question:
What kind of problems do you have during climbing?
Summary
Firstly, climbers can struggle with boring monotonous training sessions. They need inspiration and structure to train regularly.
User persona
Based on the gathered information, I made user personas.
Marketing analysis
I’ve checked the most popular rock-climbing apps on the market and found, that there are 3 main categories: navigation, training and community. Usually, apps of different types have the main specialization but also have overlapping functions.
Summary
There are three features that all Apps have in common: sharing results, checking progress, and adding routes to a log. These functions definitely should be considered important for a climbing App. Also, most of the negative comments for these Apps were about information overloading. Keeping the product simple should be one of the top priorities.
Competitor analysis
Currently, Stone Garden uses the Kaya App to provide users with actual information about gym news, route settings, and community events. To understand the pros and cons of this App, I conducted a usability testing with 5 users:
Primary audience
- Stone Gardens members and regular users - 3 people
Secondary audience
- New climber, first time user - 1 person
- Experienced climber from another gym - 1 person
Since one of the main functions of an App is navigation, it was really important to have a testing session in a field.
It took so much time and so many clicks that I prefer to ask somebody what the grade is.
I’m going to give up and close this App.
The most common problems
Home page
- "Why do I see all these random videos?"
- A lot of extra information users don’t need
Map
- The gym map is hard to read. Can’t find where are you now and where each route is.
- Navigation between bouldering and rope areas takes too many clicks and is inconsistent
Routes
- Routes dots are located too close to each other and are hard to distinguish and interact with.Sectors are in a top view. Can’t understand which wall it is at.
- No names, no grades for walls. How to find a route?
Summary
The biggest problem for all types of users were the navigation system and overloading of extra information.
After finishing the initial research, I aggregated the problems my future App needs to solve:
Welcome Crux - rock climbing App that will lead your training to the next level!
Ideate
Engage
People are social beings and deeply enjoy communicating with like-minded people. Also, everyone loves to play regardless of age.
To make sport training fun, I can:
Make it social
- Find people and follow them
- Comment and share posts, activities
- Clubs
Turn it into a game
- Challenges
- Achevements
- Leveling system
Challenges
Rock climbing challenges are connected with how many routes and therefore scores a climber makes during a specific period of time limited by this challenge. To understand, how much score gets a participant, I needed to create a formula of how to math it.
Score formula
There are 12 main grades for the bouldering rock climbing, from V0 to V12, and their difficulty isn’t linear. It's hard to measure the difficulty between the different categories the complexity and therefore the points shouldn't be growing exponentially because climbing V12 is not comparable to climbing V1. It's virtually like different types of sportsmen who climbed those two different categories. That's why the suggested formula would work as follows: each next category will be twice as hard and therefore twice as expensive as the previous one. Plus, in addition to that, there are bonus points for getting the first ascent, meaning the flash/onsite, and for the red point you have 25% bonus points and if you scored the route from the first attempt you would get another 25% and total plus 50% bonus points. This is similar to what is typically measured in professional climbing competitions and should be the good one for motivating people to climb and compare athletes against each other.
Track progress
For the tracking progress, users can:
- Search and add routes to the log
- Check statistics and progress (calculated using score formula)
Navigate
The Crux has a map of a gym and, to make the navigation system cohesive, I needed to work with both physical and digital spaces.
Considering previous users’ feedback, I concluded the next important aspects Crux must have:
- Simple navigation and clear floor plan
- 3D images of walls instead of top view
- Lines instead of dots
- Route grades on walls
Information architecture
After I had a clear vision of what Crux will be, I built an application map and created user flows:
- As a user, find a challenge and accept it
- As a user, find another user and message him
- As a user, find a route and add it into your training
Wireframes
Then I built a system of lo-fi wireframes for each flow
Prototype, Test
Mobile App
For the next stage, I did a hi-fidelity prototype and then tested it with the target audience user.
After collecting and analyzing all feedback, the prototype was refined.
I wish I’ll be able to add my own photo to the common challenges gallery.
Oh, I didn’t get that there is more than one challenge!
Personal page
With help of personal screen, user can track sport progress and stay in touch with community.
Challenge
After accepting the challenges, the user can track the progress on the personal screen. He can check how many points he has left to finish, see the participants, invite friends to join and also can add his own photos to this challenge.
Connect
Crux is a great tool for community. On the initial search screen the user can see suggested list of friends and clubs, and can follow one of these recommendations or use a search bar.
Start training
The user can start training by pressing a plus button from any App screen. Then he’ll get to the map screen and from there he can choose the room (South, North or Rope) or tab directly to the wall he is interested in.
Search a route
After choosing the wall, user get to the list of routes. He can choose the line he is interested in by tapping one from the list or by tapping one on the image. After choosing, he’ll see the route closer, check beta, ratings and reviews. Then the user can add line to his log.
Add a route to a log
User can add his own photo and choose the attempt style. If he isn't sure, what was his style, he can tap unsure and use prompt.
Finish training
When user is done with logging a route, he’ll see a notification. If he goes there, he’ll see a statistic. When the user is ready, he can finish the training and check the results.
Design system
To make a clear and cohesive visual system, I established fundamental visual principles as colors, typography, and spaces to create reusable components.
Navigation
To keep the visual design for the navigation system cohesive, I made a style board and followed it while creating graphics for walls, signs in a gyms, and the map in the App.
During interviews with Stone Gardens users, I found that some people with colorblindness have problems with understanding the route line. Sometimes adjacent routes or walls have low color contrast and it makes them hard to recognize. To solve this problem, I decided:
- Create an accessible color schema for environmental elements, as walls and signs
- Create simple rules for route setters on how to create routes
Color schema
Rules for route setters
Bad color combinations:
- Pink, Red, Green
Bad color combinations:
- Black, Blue, Red, Yellow, White
If it’s impossible to avoid bad color combinations, put a tape beyond each hold on a route.
Walls
I suggested a new painting for walls according to the accessible color schema and in cohesiveness with the style and also added a walls names.
Branding
When creating the corporate identity, I was inspired by bright vibrant colors and simple lines that can work as building figures for icons, navigation and other graphic elements.
Reflections
I’m really passionate about rock climbing and love UX design. Working in these two overlapping fields was extremely interesting for me.
Takeaways
Feel your audience
I was not only a designer for this project but also a user. The project gave me a lot of useful information and a deep understanding of the problems. I didn’t need to ask other users tons of extra questions because I immediately understood their concerns. After this project I’m sure that deeper I understand potential users, the better I can solve the problems and problems of the product.
Limitations are everywhere. And usually, they are easy to solve
It was a huge surprise for me when I found that color blind people have problems with finding a route. Surprisingly, a few of them were my friends. They had never told me that they have any problems and have never complained. It was easy to adjust and create a color system to make a basic rule that solves this issue.
Future exploration
- Develop App, add more flows
- Add animation
- Make usability testing in the gym
- Create a kit for adopting the App to the other gyms (franchise)
