01 / DISCOVERY
ACCOUNT SYSTEM
The current platform doesn’t reflect the family-based setup of the dojos, where many parents train with young children who may struggle to access the platform.
TRAINING SYLLABUS
The syllabus is text-heavy, hard to understand, and doesn’t guide students based on their upcoming grade.
VISUAL DESIGN
The platform’s design lacks consistency across different screen sizes, making it difficult to manage and poorly suited to the mobile-first preference of its users.
In order to contextualise the user problems, a persona was developed that represents the typical user group at SKKSA’s dojos.
Kevin Naicker
"I just want one place where I can keep track of all our progress, be able to help my kids with their karate at home, and stay on top of what’s happening at the dojo, without juggling three different logins."
Age: 37
Home town: Durban
Current belt: Purple
Family: Two sons (Michael, age 12 and Terrence, age 8)
Kevin, a dedicated father of two young sons involved in karate, trains alongside them to stay active and share meaningful time together. He’s looking for an easy way to manage their profiles, track attendance, and stay connected with their local dojo.
Goals
Enhance his own karate skills while helping his sons improve their technique by practicing together at home outside of dojo hours
Access his sons’ karate profiles to manage their accounts, monitor class attendance, and retrieve their student cards to help them sign-in to sessions
Stay informed with what's happening at the dojo, including special events, online classes, training schedules and grading dates
Frustrations
Managing multiple accounts is inconvenient: he needs to create separate email addresses for each of his sons to set up their MyDojo accounts, and must log in individually to access and manage each profile
Generic text-based syllabus content that's difficult to understand and not useful for practicing
Lack of family features like linking profiles and being able to use one phone to scan his and his sons' student cards to access sessions
NEW ACCOUNT SYSTEM
An intuitive, family-based account system that lets users easily access student cards and switch between family profiles.
PERSONALISED EXPERIENCE
A personalised experience designed around the user’s current belt grade, featuring engaging visual content that extends training support beyond the dojo.
MOBILE-OPTIMISED
A solution tailored to users’ real-world needs, simplifying development and maintenance whilst delivering a consistent, high-quality user experience.
02 / IDEATION
USER FLOWS
ONBOARDING
SIGNING-IN TO IN-PERSON CLASSES
AT-HOME TRAINING
SKETCH + WIREFRAMING
SKETCH
Storyboarding and user flows helped contextualise how users might interact with the design and sparked the interface ideation, which began with basic paper sketches. This is my favourite part, where the design starts coming to life.
LOW-FIDELITY WIREFRAMES
The sketches were then converted to digital wireframes to refine selected ideas.
SIGN-UP
ONBOARDING
HOME
VIRTUAL DOJO & PROFILE
03 / VALIDATION
USABILITY TESTING
The low-fidelity wireframes were used to conduct usability tests with instructors and students at various SKKSA dojos.
04 / SOLUTION
DESIGN FRAMEWORK
HIGH-FIDELITY MOCKUPS
HOME PAGE
VIRTUAL DOJO
VIRTUAL DOJO - ALL VARIANTS
PROFILE
PROTOTYPE
05 / KEY TAKEAWAYS
For fitness-focussed user experiences, the following design principles are important:
Matching system to real-world
Users prefer a digital experience that mirrors their real-world setup. For MyDojo, aligning the account system with dojo family structures improved related features like personalisation, account switching, and session sign-ins.
Prioritising visual over text
Fitness app users prefer visual aids that support their practice, as they typically lack the time or focus to engage with lengthy text.
Goal-gradient effect
Progress visualisation boosts users' motivation to complete tasks. Features like attendance tracking and the personalised virtual dojo are examples of this approach.
NEXT STEPS
I am building this project as a Flutter web app. The goal is to release the first version (prioritising sign-up, attendance tracking and the virtual dojo) in July 2025, to coincide with SKKSA's 25th anniversary.
Creating a health & fitness app?
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