For Tonal, the first 30 days determined long-term success — but the experience was fragmented. Users unboxed complex hardware with little guidance, struggled to complete their first strength assessment, and dropped off before forming a habit. Guided content engagement was low, and no one had a holistic view of what the first-time experience actually felt like.
I led Tonal’s first foundational longitudinal study to map the end-to-end onboarding and early engagement journey — from unboxing to workout streak formation.
Over eight weeks, I conducted a 22-participant diary study augmented with product analytics and follow-up interviews to uncover behavioral friction, motivational triggers, and the emotional “first-date” moments that defined retention.
The study revealed that users didn’t fail because they lacked motivation — they failed because the system didn’t guide them. I created Tonal’s first cross-functional service blueprint mapping every touchpoint across hardware, software, content, and communication.
The blueprint identified three core redesign areas: hardware learning, goal-setting integration, and the first-workout experience — and directly informed Tonal’s 2023 company-wide OKRs and product roadmap priorities.
This foundational work drove +24 % guided content engagement, +18 % mobile usage, and +0.5 workouts per week, while giving every team — from Product to C-suite — a shared understanding of how to create early habit formation.
8-week mixed-method longitudinal study with 22 participants — combining diary research, behavioral analytics, and follow-up interviews to map Tonal’s first 30 days.
Business Challenge
Fragmented onboarding and inconsistent first-time experiences.
No single view of the early journey to inform roadmap or OKRs.
Hardware setup anxiety and unclear progression caused early churn.
Product, Design, and Marketing prioritized independently, without shared behavioral insight.
Approach
Phase 1 — Discover
Ran an 8-week mixed-method longitudinal study combining diary entries, product telemetry, and follow-up interviews.
Captured both emotional journeys and behavioral data across setup, first workout, and habit formation.
Revealed four behavioral archetypes by mapping new users’ confidence, experience, and goal-setting aptitude — uncovering what truly drives (or blocks) early engagement.
Phase 2 — Define
Created a journey map + emotional arc visualizing confidence highs/lows across 30 days.
Identified four archetypes (The Planner, The Beginner, The Competitor, The Tracker) and mapped pain points by system.
Synthesized findings into a company-wide onboarding blueprint spanning hardware, app, content, and communications.
(Part 1) Visualized the full onboarding journey — from purchase to install — to expose fragmented touchpoints and misaligned expectations across teams and channels.
(Part 2) Mapped emotional highs and lows across installation and first workouts, surfacing where motivation dropped and guidance cues failed to appear.
Phase 3 — Develop & Deliver
Partnered with cross-functional teams to design new goal-setting flow and routine-scheduling system tied to motivation profiles.
Redesigned hardware-orientation tutorials and functional-movement-screen experience to anchor “first workout success.”
Worked with Content + Design to revamp workout cards, coach previews, and discovery UI to support new user goals.
Benchmarked against expert coaching models to design an evidence-based framework for behavioral guidance, goal-setting, and early success reinforcement.
Insights
Confidence comes from clarity: early success depends on transparent guidance, not motivation.
Goal-setting alignment created measurable lift in early consistency.
Hardware mastery was the biggest predictor of confidence and repeat usage.
Emotional mapping revealed when to introduce motivation, feedback, and celebration cues.
Defined Tonal’s onboarding and intake blueprint — now embedded in every new product flow.
Established onboarding KPIs adopted company-wide and integrated into OKR dashboards.
Connected early behavioral insight to tangible roadmap priorities across teams.
Leadership & Influence
Principal-level IC (L8) scope:
Led cross-functional workshops with C-level executives and department heads to align on feature prioritization and roadmap for the year.
Unified Product, Marketing, Design, and Ops around a single behavioral framework.
Mentored PMs and researchers on journey mapping, blueprinting, and behavioral instrumentation.
Positioned research as a strategic input to roadmap definition, not just validation.
Led executive workshop aligning Product, Design, and Marketing on redesign priorities — directly shaping Tonal’s 2023 onboarding OKRs and roadmap.
Organizational Impact
This project became the foundational blueprint for Tonal’s 2023 strategy. Every major initiative that year — from onboarding redesign to mobile retention flows — traced back to this work. It established a shared language across functions and reframed onboarding as a behavioral system rather than a setup flow — connecting early success to long-term engagement.
