The story started when I was exploring on my own new forms of interfaces that we can use in connection to our ambient environment and our bodies to accelerate learning -- whether it's music (eg. playing a guitar) or fitness (workouts, stretching). This brought me to explore what we can do with a smart mirror and I started prototyping a mirror to see what we can do with it.

I also explored other types of sensors such as EMG and EEG, and repaired a broken MYO armband from my friend to see what we can do with it. I ended up spending more time working on smart mirrors because it seems to bring a lot of possibilities of interactions with the screen with a wider variety of full-body movements.

After that, I found out that Kara Smart Fitness is working on a fitness mirror, so I helped the company as a consultant to dive deeper into how smart mirrors can facilitate interactive classes to improve workout performance.

Impact

Throughout my time at the company, I also created a type of AI fitness workout game that improved user engagement by 15% and resulted in, together with the sales' teams efforts, sales partnerships such as HKBN. I also helped improve the number of weekly paid mirrors by 3x through working on user acquisition (website landing page, partnering with ads agendy on marketing ad videos). Futhermore, I helped set up data analysis tracking on Amplitude and defined the core user metrics & dashboards.

From attracting mall/gym passersby to creating AI interactive fitness games

One of our major sales channel other than online marketing was through offline stores and partnerships with malls, hotels, corporate gyms, and more. However, users found it hard to spot anything special about the mirror when they were passing by. Therefore, we introduced a catchy screensaver that brought users to a 3-min interactive fitness workout challenge that measured the users performance, compared their performance with other users, and provided them with workout recommendations. Through just 3 mins, users could experience the benefit of the mirror.

We realized that this was a very popular game, and the demo also attracted more sales partnerships. We decided to incorporate a similar type of content into our core consumer mirror product, where users could play AI interactive fitness games that provided them with workout recommendations. One of the user problems was that users were not sure about their fitness level and the courses that fit. With the AI interactive game, we could measure their performance through cardio and strength exercises and provide them with workout recommenations based on their strength, balance, and cardiovascular fitness.

Customer acquisition - website redesign

Like many e-commerce stores, the product's website play an important role in the purchase decision. Therefore, for one month, we focused entirely on user acquisition and spent some time revamping the website. For the website design and copy, we focused more on the target audience of female mothers as that had been a dominant user base for us. These were some major changes that we created:

1. ARTICULATE PRODUCT VALUE

It is not just a mirror and some courses. The mirror turns your home into a versatile gym, a boxing studio, a yoga sanctuary, a cardio playground, and much more. For busy mothers, nothing is as convenient and comfortable as working out at home and as fun as working out together as a family. With computer vision, the mirror can also assess your performance and provide you with recommended workouts. We also emphasized on our workout variety for all levels of fitness.

2. REMOVE FRICTION AND CREATE TRUST

Frictions play a huge role in preventing users from buying, especially for a HK$12,500 mirror. We made the purchase process as low risk and friction as possible, providing options for monthly payments, 30-day risk free trials, live demos, and in-person delivery & installation. Also, user testimonials, one-year warranty, and customer logos all help to create trust.