How Welltory grows

First onboarding screen makes a bold curiosity promise ('Your Apple Watch knows what makes you tired and stressed. Hook up your data, and we'll show you what's going on') and the only button is 'Sync my health data'. No 1-3 slide prelude explaining the app. Data agreements/privacy screens (never sell or share data) follow.

1) Human problem: study it deeply for months (she re-listened to the podcast The Dream) and know when in the day users feel it; usually already pitched in the ad, so onboarding doesn't open with it. 2) Product promise: a bold, curious first screen. 3) Key: something only you know ('sedentary stress' - you already have 192 minutes of it today, from their real data). 4) Mechanism: how the app uses the key (real-time view of when stress builds and when you relieve it; 'you're only relieving ~20% of it'). 5) Proof scattered throughout: their own data, 5-star reviews, millions of users, journal publications, university partnerships (a trust screen right before the 'science' section). 6) FOMO: what bad thing happens today if they don't pay. The whole story arc mattered more than polishing copy on each screen.

While analysis runs, a 'warming up' screen shows how much data is being processed. Then: minutes of stress from a recent clean day (e.g. 192 minutes), a timeline of their day with stressed/active/recovering periods and an animated zoom on a blue recovery period ('your body was doing a good job' - empowerment after the scare), then an animated 30-day calendar of built-up stress, and the share they relieved on their own (~20-30%). All numbers come from the user's real Apple Watch data.

Final pre-paywall/paywall headline: 'Stress is building right now', with subhead about seeing what's driving it and how to interrupt it: unless you pay, it keeps draining you and you'll feel just as tired tonight. Replaced an energy-story ending ('Stay with us', an energy bank filling up, a chart of how much better you'll feel in a week and a month).

After the agreement, permission and education screens, a 'now, in the next 2 minutes you'll see what's stealing your energy' screen, a trust screen, then the question 'Ever feel tired even when you haven't done much all day?' (Yes, I know that feeling / No, it never happens to me). Goal is to slow down and put users back in the emotional state that brought them, not to get agreement; the next screen names the cause (hidden stress).

Every Meta ad uses one hook: this app shows what's happening inside your body, something scary is probably happening, and you want to know. Ads attach it to different physiological processes, e.g. 'This Apple Watch app catches high cortisol' (a stand-in for the measured 'sedentary stress'), arteries. Visuals: Apple Watch scrolling colorful charts with a big red number; voiceover lists symptoms (bad sleep, sugar cravings) then names the cause.

Onboarding paywall usually shows only the annual plan, $99.99/year displayed as $8.83/month; sometimes a monthly option. No free trial; the paywall can be closed ('hard-ish'). Little pricing testing because the company feels too small to offer more pricing options given churn.

Free: vital health tracking (signs you're getting sick), blood pressure entry and analysis, energy battery, stress built up, sleep score, activity. Paid: trends over time, the day timeline showing drained/recovering/reversing periods, and activity recommendations to improve artery elasticity and stress resilience.

Instead of charts and metrics, packed a rigorous heart rate variability analysis into a liquid visualization that changes color and behavior with the body's state: red and bubbling over when stressed, green when energized, ocean blue when calm and focused. Data is pulled automatically from the Apple Watch, so users get it by doing nothing.

Users can connect 1,000+ data sources, e.g. a developer's GitHub commits. An algorithm constantly scans for statistically meaningful correlations and sends personal ones such as 'when you run in the evenings, your GitHub commits the next day go up', instead of distant risks like heart attacks in 10 years.

For new core features (not monetization tweaks): 1) does it fit the mission (improve well-being with science, personalized); 2) which segment is it for, keeping the main persona in mind ('the Dude' from The Big Lebowski, with AI-generated images of him at the office, on the couch); 3) what trigger brings them to it; 4) what immediate and high-level job it does; 5) which of seven retention drivers it uses: magic, novelty, relief, personalization, gamification, bragging rights, social; 6) is it a must (competitors have it, fulfills an ad promise, absence causes switching or extreme frustration); 7) is it a delighter (completes a known job delightfully or creates a wow moment). Tried giving 10 points per box and building the top scorer; dropped it. Use as prompts, not a scorecard, including for competitor analysis.

The onboarding spends several screens on the user's stress and the effect it might have on their health before the paywall. The paywall screen has no list of features; it leans into the stress pain point instead.

Right after the health-data sync and data agreement screens, before any analysis or value is shown, the onboarding asks users to turn on notifications, contrary to the usual 'show value first' advice.

Segmentation question on how users usually feel, with six options covering both energy wording (low on energy, tired and drained) and stress wording (sometimes stressed, pretty good no complaints), since women and men describe the same state differently.

Spent 1.5-2 years breaking down silos between the marketing team and product. Product read the winning ads for the overall promise ('make visible what's going on inside your body') and built toward that, rather than copying the exact features shown in ads.

First App Store asset is a video with the CTA 'Find out how you're really feeling in 2 minutes. Let's check.', followed by screenshots: 'All your health in one app', 'Get your energy back', 'Track sleep and recovery', 'Learn ways to reverse stress', 'Monitor blood pressure', 'Turn data into insights'. The 2-minute promise is repeated inside onboarding.

Realized mass-market users have no daily 'job' or real-life trigger to open a wellness app (unlike athletes or sick people). Targeted the boredom trigger instead (standing in line, on the couch before Netflix): made the app as entertaining as a social feed, showing something new on every open, and removed goal-setting and shaming metrics that make users feel worse. Keep accurate information, but not as the only thing users see.

Before generative AI, built an in-house 'infinite content generation system' that changes the text and visuals users see as their data changes: about 45 message types, each with near-infinite variants (enough text for four volumes of Lord of the Rings). The guest advises using generative AI today rather than building this by hand.

For years insights lived only in a feed, which worked but users expect an organized home screen from a health app. Built a more static home screen around 'sedentary stress' that reacts to every step and heartbeat the watch tracks and explains what it means, instead of showing numbers like 'stress 48%'. Apple Watch first; other trackers later because data formats differ.

Built 'more scientific' rings than Apple's: personalized cardio zones and smarter move goals per user.

Much of the content is shareable, e.g. the color-changing 'fuel tank' visualization ('my tank is blue today because I'm super calm'), so users can post it to their social media. Modeled on Duolingo's shareable badges.

Welltory pulls the user's data in during onboarding and immediately shows some insights about them, instead of telling them the app can give insights.

Offered personalized programs where users do things during the day, then check off what they did, like a 'Duolingo for health'.