Overview
TrainHeroic exists to help coaches and athletes be their best.
The coaching platform's primary objective is to help coaches plan training sessions (workouts) and deliver that information (intelligently) to their many athletes.
Since 2014 I’ve operated as the solo designer (Director of User Experience) for TrainHeroic and it's many products for athletes and coaches.
In this case study I’ll cover the primary efforts related to the web coaching platform.
Roles (2014 - Present)
- UX Director
- Product Owner
Responsibilities
- Research & Insights
- User Testing & Studies
- Experience Strategy & Vision
- Product Planning Scope/Definition
- Design Definition & Specification
- Creative Leadership
Multidisciplinary Team
- Engineering
- Marketing/Social
- Sales/Support
- Business Development
Background
Before TrainHeroic, the typical coach would deliver programming in a number of archaic ways.
Printed sheets (from excel) with athletes numbers manually calculated each week.
White boards that provided generic guidance and lack personalization to the athlete.
Text/Facebook messages that mirrored the whiteboard content.
On top of that, the process of receiving compliance (logged training data) was equally antiquated:
Athletes were forced to fill out the paper sheets daily and turn them in (requiring the coach to manually enter the most pertinent information).
Athletes would write their scores/results on the whiteboard but ultimately would have to keep a physical log of their own choosing. This left the coach extra blind to what was going on in the gym.
Athlete could text or post their results as a reply to the coaches prescription, but this was chaotic and required .
Although there was merit in the above mediums, they lacked speed, efficiency, personalization, and delight. All resulting in athletes that were disengaged and tracked inconsistently and coaches that spent copious amounts of time flying blind.
Users
Coaches who train many athletes in-facility.
Coaches who train many remote athletes.
Coaches who train athletes one-on-one.
Needs
Coaches need a way to program and deliver prescribed training to athletes that is faster than excel, better than paper, and proactive enough to keep them ahead of athlete needs.
Goal
To create the #1 strength and conditioning platform for coaches.
We completed hundreds of hours of user testing, shadowing and manual QA of the coaching platform. Additionally, we surveyed coaches regarding their training methodologies and habits to try an glean insight into universal
We found that coaches typically use between 20-30 exercises. The same small subset of prescriptions was also true. The idea of an "object oriented planning" extended farther downstream than we initially recognized.
Problem 1
How can we speed up the programming process?
Problem 2
How can we proactively give coaches more visibility?
Problem 3
How do combat against poor connections?
Results (as of January 2018)
+700%
User Growth since 2014
321K
MAUs
+30B
Pounds Lifted
+1M
Personal Records
+3M
Training Session Logged
> 300 hrs
Testing, Interview, Surveys
★★★★☆
App Rating
+200%
Net Promoter Score
5 hrs
Average time saved per month
+1000%
Increase in program efficiency
< 1 min
to program a training session
+7,000
Coaches minds blown
