Boostability - A Personalized Onboarding Experience

Boostability is an AI-powered task management tool designed for college students with ADHD. After a pilot program in the spring of 2024, I joined Boostability as a UI/UX Intern during the summer of 2024 to help launch the product to 50 beta users in the fall of 2024.

In addition to contributing to the ADHD-friendly design system and acting as the accessibility advocate to ensure our designs met WCAG2.0 standards, I spearheaded the creation of an onboarding flow that personalized the product to each user on sign-up.

Role: Lead Onboarding UX Designer

Collaborators: 7 UX/UI Designers, 2 Developers, 2 Marketing Associates, and Boostability’s Founder

Timeline: 9 Weeks (June - August 2024)

Tools: Mobbin, Figma, Google Drive, Bubble

In preparation for the beta launch, I tackled a crucial challenge: creating an onboarding survey that would not only gather essential information about our users with ADHD but also effectively personalize our AI-powered academic support system.

With a target of 100 beta users, we needed to balance collecting comprehensive data with maintaining the cognitive load of our users.

Background:

With college students with ADHD graduating at significantly lower rates than their neurotypical peers, Boostability aims to bridge this gap by providing personalized academic support that works with, rather than against, ADHD traits. One of the major frustrations of those with ADHD is task paralysis.

Task Paralysis:
a symptom of ADHD marked by having the drive and awareness to accomplish tasks but not being able to start or complete them.

Boostability tackles task paralysis by:

  • Breaking down complex academic tasks into manageable steps

  • Adapting these steps based on each student's unique strengths, challenges, and work patterns.

The Problem:

My first few weeks at Boostability were focused on understanding users with ADHD and helping the team initiate the design system and initial wireframes.

As we conducted user research, I noticed the following:

  • The market is flooded with productivity tools

  • People with ADHD are known to struggle with challenges with impulsivity and emotional regulation

  • Due to these challenges, people with ADHD may have higher drop-off rates for productivity tools if the product doesn’t work for them

Recognizing that effective personalization would be crucial for maintaining engagement and reducing frustration among users with ADHD, I was tasked with designing an onboarding survey that would gather essential information while minimizing cognitive overload. This survey would be the foundation for how the AI broke down user tasks, which would adapt the application to the specific needs of each user.

My challenge was clear:

How can we make Boostability personalized to users from sign-up to decrease the potential drop-off rate?

Understanding the Landscape:

Competitive Analysis

I analyzed the onboarding surveys of 8 leading educational and productivity apps across both mobile and desktop platforms, including popular services like Duolingo, Todoist, and Babbel.

Key Findings:

With an average of 5 questions, competitors favored concise onboarding processes.

The most popular question type was multiple-choice.

  • 90% of competitors used progress indicators to maintain user momentum.

  • Flexibility in the onboarding process (like skippable questions) improved user experience and decreased cognitive load.

Most apps acknowledged user inputs through customized loading screens with personalized messaging.

I first met with the founder to learn more about the initial onboarding survey used in the pilot program, which was focused on the student’s educational background and current organization processes. We also defined the critical information needed to personalize the AI system with the development team.

AI-Integration

I identified gaps in our understanding of user motivation and challenges, and working closely with our engineering team, I mapped out how each question would feed into our AI model:

  • Academic goals would guide task prioritization

  • Self-organization assessments would influence task breakdown strategies

  • Focus preferences would shape study session recommendations

Iterating and Collaborating:

Developing the Survey

While users may be familiar with prompting AI LLMs like ChatGPT, we found in testing the onboarding survey that new users didn’t provide quality answers.

Instead, we pivoted to the competitive norm of Select All and Multiple Choice questions to preserve cognitive load. However, this also limited the potential personalization options.

Survey Evolution:

Version 1

  • 6 Questions

  • All Free-Response Questions

  • Simple/broad questions on organizational habits

  • Inherited from the pilot program

Example Question Evolution:

What are your biggest challenges in college?

Version 2

  • 11 Questions

  • 9 Multiple Choice + 2 Free Response

  • More targeted questions about goals/challenges

  • Key Update: Aimed at gathering deeper insights for AI personalization

Which of these academic tasks do you find most challenging?
(Select up to 3)

  • Starting assignments

  • Staying focused during lectures

  • Meeting deadlines

  • Understanding complex readings

  • Organizing my thoughts in writing

  • Preparing for exams

  • Speaking up in class

  • Working in groups

Brand Integration and Final Polish:

Once our marketing team established Boostability's brand voice, I incorporated this personality into the survey.

This led to several key improvements:

  • Integrated friendly, conversational tone

  • Added emojis to create an engaging, modern feel

  • Incorporated ADHD-positive language like "ADHD Superstar moments"

Version 3

  • 9 Questions

  • 8 Multiple Choice + 1 Free Response

  • Strong ADHD-focused approach

  • Key Update: Brand Tone + Voice

Which of these academic tasks are the biggest challenges for you?
(Select up to 2)

  • Time Management "I struggle with managing my time, meeting deadlines, and balancing my academic workload with other responsibilities."

  • Organization "I find it challenging to keep my assignments and notes organized."

  • Task Execution "I have a hard time breaking down large projects into smaller, manageable tasks and following through on study plans and goals."

  • Focus "I find it difficult to stay focused during study sessions and to complete assignments on time without feeling overwhelmed."

  • Task Initiation “I feel overwhelmed or unmotivated with my assignments, so I put off starting anything until the last minute."

Final Product

The Figma prototype of the final survey

The final survey design achieves multiple crucial objectives:

  • Personalizes the Generative AI Task Break Down Feature by collecting user data on strengths, weaknesses, and focus tools to generate customized study plans.

  • Streamlines the Beta Onboarding Process by efficiently onboarding 50 users for the Fall 2024 beta test.

  • Ensures an ADHD-Friendly Experience with a short, low-cognitive-load survey using clear and accessible question formats.

  • Aligns with Brand Voice and Tone by balancing marketing’s request for an energetic, friendly, and motivating style with the need for brevity and clarity.

  • Provides Usable Data for Future Enhancements by gathering insights that can inform future product iterations, such as improved focus routines and additional task-chunking customization options.

This survey established a strong foundation for understanding and supporting our initial 50 users. While my time at Boostability has ended, I hope that the survey continues to evolve based on beta user feedback and the AI performance data.

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Nomie