Mysubs
A trustworthy subscription tracking App
Key Skills
Competitive Analysis, Secondary Research, Surveys, Interviews,
Empathy Mapping, Persona,
User Flows, Wireframes,
Hi-Fidelity Prototypes
My role
This project was done solely by me as part of the Springboard’s UI/UX Design program. I was responsible for the end-to-end design as a UX Researcher, UX Designer, and UI Designer.
Timeline
MARCH 2021 (4 Weeks)
The Problem
It’s challenging to keep track of all the products and services that we subscribe to each month. All we see is money deducted from our accounts for services that we might not even need or want anymore. Since the number of subscriptions each household has increased during the Covid-19 period, it is harder for most people to manage their subscriptions.
The Solution
-
Design a mobile app where users can see all of their subscriptions in one place so that they can get a comprehensive view of their spending on subscriptions.
-
Enable unsubscription through the app to prevent excessive payments so that they can reduce needless spending.
-
Notify users about auto-renewals to guide their decision-making.
Design Process
-
Competitive Analysis
-
Secondary Research
-
Screener Survey
-
User Interviews
-
Personas
-
User Flows
-
Wireframes
-
Visual Design
-
Usability Tests
Research
Research Goal
I aimed to define the target market and identify behaviors, pain points, and goals of the users while managing their subscriptions.
Methods used:
-
Competitive Analysis
-
Secondary Research: articles, studies, websites, blogs
-
Screener Survey
-
User interviews
Competitive Analysis
I started my research by analyzing three different subscription tracking apps that are popular on the app store: Subtrack, Subscription Manager, and Bobby.
Subscription Manager
Bobby
Subtrack
These three apps are very similar to each other. For example:
-
You can see all your subscriptions and how much you pay for them (both separately and in total) on one page.
-
And you can set reminders for each subscription so that the apps will remind you of the renewal and/or billing dates.
However,
-
You can not cancel your subscriptions through these apps.
-
You can not see your payment history.
-
You can not make a payment through the app.
Subscription Tracker (Set a Reminder)
Bobby
(Add a subscription)
Subtrack
(Add a subscription)
Secondary Research
For secondary research, I read some news articles and blogs. It is very clear from my research that the pandemic is accelerating the shift to the subscription economy.
-
Consumers have to rely on subscriptions for entertainment, education, remote work tools, health and well-being essentials, etc. more than they did before during these quarantine times.
-
Video and music streaming has led to the rapid growth of online subscription services for stay-at-home households during 2020.
-
Online subscriptions have become a growth area within e-commerce and will continue in the foreseeable future.
-
Through 2022, online subscriptions will find higher growth due to the continued consumer popularity of streaming services and software.
69% of households now subscribe to one or more video streaming subscription services.
41% of households subscribe to one or more streaming music services.
70% of business leaders say subscription business models will be key to their prospects in the years ahead.
The average number of subscriptions among consumers subscribed to at least one service
increased 22% from February (2020) to July.
In 2019, we each spent $640 on digital subscriptions like streaming video and music services, cloud storage, dating apps, and online productivity tools.
Another remarkable research by Waterstone Management Group shows that most Americans are unaware of how many subscriptions they have. They conducted an analysis of 2,500 Americans’ budgets and concluded that 84 % underestimated what they spend on subscriptions each month.
Primary Research
After completing the secondary research, I moved into my primary research with a screener survey and sent it out to find interview candidates. I tried to learn how many subscriptions participants have, how they track these subscriptions, how satisfied they are with this management, and if they use a tracking/management app. I sent out the screener and received 44 responses.
Most of the participants implied that either they don’t track their subscriptions or they track them casually.
And later while I was doing the interviews, I saw that this situation causes people to underestimate how much they pay for the services they are subscribed to. Because during the interviews all participants realized that they had more subscriptions than they chose in the screener.
1:1 Interviews
I reached out to people who have subscriptions. I interviewed 5 of them. Out of these 5 interviewees 1 of them has never used a subscription tracking app, 1 of them uses an app and 3 of them used an app before but now they don’t use anything to track their subscriptions.
Guiding Interview Questions
My aim was to answer the following questions by the end of the interviews:
-
How do the participants keep track of their subscriptions? What kind of challenges do they face?
-
How often do they use the services they are subscribed to? Do they know how many subscriptions they have and how much they pay for them?
-
How was their experience while canceling a subscription?
-
How do they keep track of subscription renewals? Have they ever received some unexpected deduction from their account from subscription auto-renewal?
-
If they use any subscription tracking app, how do they like it? What are the good sides of the app they are using? How can it be improved?
Key Insights from the Interviews
-
All interviewees realized that they had more subscriptions than they expected during the interviews.
-
All interviewees know the general amount they pay for their subscriptions but they don’t know an exact number.
-
Most of the participants are satisfied with the subscriptions they have. If they realize they don’t use a service very often, they usually prefer to unsubscribe.
-
It seems hard for most people, especially those who have many subscriptions, to keep track of the renewal dates.
-
Almost all participants have experienced forgetting about a service and paying for it for a few months until they realize they didn’t use it.
-
Another thing most of them reported is that they have experienced an unexpected deduction from their accounts because of a subscription auto-renewal or a free subscription starting to charge.
-
Most of the time it takes a while for people to realize when there is a price change in their subscriptions.
-
It is always very hard to cancel a subscription. It is very easy to subscribe but the unsubscribe button is always hidden somewhere.
Empathy Mapping
I distilled these insights into an empathy map. Thanks to this empathy mapping, I was able to dive deeper into the potential users and organize my observations and insights to empathize with their challenges, goals, thoughts, feelings, and experiences.
Persona
I used these empathy mapping insights to create user types. I created a persona.
Design Considerations
Subscriptions page: We should design a page where users can see all their subscriptions on one page. They should also be able to see the billing dates and the fee.
Reports: Users should be able to see the monthly and annual reports of their subscriptions in the app. They can track how much they spend on what kind of categories.
Reminders: Users should be able to set reminders to alert them of their billing and renewal dates of their subscriptions.
Unsubscribe Button: One of the common pain points of the interviewees is the fact that it is always very difficult to cancel a subscription. Therefore, the app should help the users unsubscribe from their subscriptions very easily.
User Flows
I created the user flows based on the red routes I identified.
-
Adding a subscription
-
Canceling a subscription.
.jpg)
.jpg)
Wireframes
After I created all the red routes and user flows, I started to prepare the low-fidelity wireframes using Figma. I tried to show how users would navigate through different pages of the app.
Prototyping
Next, I created an interactive prototype from these wireframes.
1st Round of Usability Testing
I conducted 5 moderated usability tests with the prototype I prepared from my low-fidelity screens to get some initial feedback on designs. The tests were held remotely via zoom. The sessions captured each participant’s navigational choices, task completion rates, comments, overall satisfaction, and feedback.
I asked the participants to do some basic tasks such as signing up, adding a subscription, setting a reminder, canceling a subscription and checking out the profile page.
Key Insights from the First Round of Usability Tests
-
Participants said if they are using this app, they shouldn’t miss a due date. The ‘Missed Subscriptions’ page looks irrelevant and contradicts the aim of the app.
-
Having both ‘delete’ and ‘unsubscribe’ buttons was confusing. 3 of the 5 participants didn’t understand the difference between them.
-
The app should notify when the fee of a subscription increases or there are certain sales or discounts for the services that you are subscribed to.
-
The app doesn’t show the history of payment.
UI Design
Before creating my high-fidelity screens, I had to determine the visual language I will use throughout my product so I created a style guide. I wanted the app to be trustworthy, caring, friendly, and casual.
Style Guide
High Fidelity Screens
The feedback from the first round of usability testing fed into the high-fidelity screens. Considering the user feedback, I incorporated some changes as I designed the high-fidelity screens.
2nd Round of Usability Testing
After designing the high-fidelity screens, I prepared another interactive prototype of the app. Then, I conducted another round of moderated usability tests with 5 different participants.
Key Insights from the 2nd Round of Usability Tests
-
Social media login / sign up icons don’t attract attention at the bottom of the page. Users said they realized them after they wrote their email addresses and usernames although they would prefer to use one of them.
-
Adding a payment method was confusing for most of the users. They said while subscribing to all these services, they give their payment info. They would rather not use the app for payment.
-
Save button was on the top right of the page but most participants tend to check the bottom of the page for the save button. In the end they found it, but it would be more efficient to move it to the bottom of the page.
-
Users deleting the subscription from the app is not something we would want. However, it is a primary button on the specific subscription page and it is eye catching so it might be tempting for the users.
-
Home page and Subscriptions page look very similar. The purpose of the home page is to show the upcoming payments for subscriptions but they don’t attract attention. The billing dates don’t stand out.
What I Have Learned
-
I understood that usability testing is very important. It is one of the key steps that should be conducted carefully in order to provide a more user friendly product.
-
Analyzing the market is a good way of research before starting a project because it gives you very important insights about the expectations from your product.
Next Steps
-
As a next step, I would love to design a page where users can link their subscriptions with the app so the app can warn the users if they don’t use a service very often for a long time. When users receive a notification about a paid service that they don’t use very often, they can decide if they need to pay for the subscription or not.