SaaS Coaching Platform With a Mobile App
Online Coaching
Australia
2024-Ongoing
Customer
The customer for this app is a personal development coach with the goal of helping people worldwide enhance their lives. They had already tried several existing online coaching platforms but realized they all had one major flaw. None allows a coach to be present for students during tough moments to provide the support and motivation they need to persist.
This inspired the idea for the app, which the customer brought to us for development.
Challenge
The customer intended to first build and fine-tune a mobile coaching app that both they and their students would enjoy using, with plans to then offer it to other coaches on a subscription basis.
The distinguishing feature and key benefit of this app was supposed to be its ability to collect student feedback, specifically focused on tracking trigger moments when they felt like quitting. Moreover, it should enable a coach to set up personalized reminders and motivational messages for those critical situations.
And of course, the app also needed to include a convenient functionality for a coach to share their program and monitor the students’ progress.
Solution
Since the customer’s list of desired features for the app was quite extensive, we suggested splitting the development into several stages. This way, an MVP with enough functionality to begin coaching could be made available sooner, and we could directly evaluate what needed improvement based on its usage.
In terms of tech decisions, we opted for cross-platform mobile development to build student-oriented mobile apps for Android and iOS, plus an admin interface for coaches, conveniently accessible through a web app. This approach allows for a near-native user experience across all planned features and also delivers the greatest benefit within the budget.
From the start, the app was designed as a cloud solution with multi-tenant architecture, ready for subscription-based distribution.
The following description gives a clear idea of the app’s scope and functional capabilities.
Key App Features
Basic learning tools available to students
Upon entering the app, students find familiar tools common to this type of platform. These tools enable them to easily reach their personal learning plan, connect with the coach, and access reference materials:
- Text chat with the coach
- Dashboard visualizing personal goals, easily scalable up or down to daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly views, and with detailed milestones for every goal
- Daily to-do lists with specific objectives
- Library of relevant reference resources, featuring both text and multimedia content
- FAQ section with answers relevant to the individual student
Advanced learning tools for tracking progress and identifying demotivation triggers
These features are an important element of the customer's unique concept, intended to monitor not only progress in goal achievement but also the student’s experience and struggles:
- Personalized daily checklists, where each point may have an attached image, audio, or video file, illustrating the user’s experience
- Daily task time tracker
- Student’s private diary with guided prompts to track which parts of their daily tasks they found challenging
Personalized motivation tools
These are the app’s defining features, which the customer regards as the core tools for securing coaching success:
- Unique alarm system managed entirely by the coach, allowing them to record personalized voice messages for each student and set the specific time for playback
- Push notifications with personalized messages from the coach designed to remind, support, and motivate
- Rewards panel featuring achieved milestones along with personalized bandages and ranks given by the coach
Admin panel for coaches
This part of the app provides coaches with all the tools necessary to manage the learning process, offering both automation and extensive personalization features:
- Developing templates for learning programs with options for later personalization
- Client management system for organizing all student information, including communication history and progress toward their goals
- Scheduler for all coaching activities integrated with Google Calendar
- Managing prices, payment methods, and trial period access
- Report generation with metrics on engagement, learning achievements, and sales, both for specific students and the entire program
Team Composition and Project Timeline
The project team consisted of a UI/UX designer and two mobile developers. We released an MVP that is ready for student use within six weeks. The full functionality was delivered within three months.
Results
The customer immediately began using the app intensively with their students, and the feedback was incredibly encouraging. One feature that especially resonated with students was the alarm clock with a voice message from their coach.
“When at 5 a.m. it’s not a boring alarm, but your coach personally wakes you up for a run, reminding you that your goal is worth getting up for right now, it really makes a difference and sets the tone for the entire day.” These are typical words from a student sharing their experience.
The customer found the app to be convenient for use as well. However, after discussions with early adopters among coaches, they realized that before starting a widespread marketing campaign, it would be wise to enhance the app with a few additional modules.
Thus, our team is set to enter a new phase of active development soon. This phase will primarily involve building improved tools for creating healthy eating plans and weight loss programs.
Services Provided
Technologies Used
- Flutter
- NextJS
- React
- Prisma
- Postgres
- Firebase / Firestore
- GoogleAPI
- Amazon
- Stripe / PayPal
- Twilio