Pursuant Health
Increasing User Retention Through Persuasive Nudges
ROLE
UX Researcher
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TIMELINE
August - September 2025
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TEAM
Ashlyn McClendon, Mandy Lin, Mili Parikh
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SKILLS
UX Research, UX Design, Usability Testing
OVERVIEW
We devised persuasive nudges to increase user retention at Pursuant Health Kiosks
As a team of 3 user researchers + designers, we conducted user research and redesigned the onboarding system over 28 weeks to encourage user account creation and retention
User Research
Conducting 6 user research methods with a total sample of over 2,500 unique participants
Prototyping & Testing
Going wide in ideation based on design implications from research and rapidly testing concepts with users.
Iterating with Feedback
Continuously iterating on concepts and validating product decisions with experts and users alike.
PROBLEM
Most people don't create accounts and don't return to Pursuant's health kiosks
Pursuant has over 4600 kiosks across the US and their kiosks have delivered over 275 million screenings so far. Their kiosks provide free and accessible health screenings through a national network of FDA-cleared medical kiosks.
In spite of having such a huge network of kiosks, they are facing huge problems with user retention and user data collection and/or profiling to help improve their services.
So, Pursuant Health gave us a challenge:
How might we design a seamless and secure onboarding experience that encourages users to create accounts and return to the kiosk?
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SOLUTION
We Created a Redesigned Onboarding with New Phone-Friendly Methods
The result of around 4 months of UX research and design was a redesigned onboarding system, a new QR code phone login, and a 1 step log in for returning users using their mobile wallet
Shows users the benefits
Shows users the value of the using the kiosk on the welcome page
Uses intentional color contrasts, reduces visual clutter and streamlines the onboarding options
Turning a 10 step process to 3 simple steps
Task analysis from user research helped us to turn a long process into a simple easy to follow onboarding
Apple Wallet Quick Log In
Shows users the value of the using the kiosk on the welcome page
Uses intentional color contrasts, reduces visual clutter and streamlines the onboarding options
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USER RESEARCH
We engaged with 2000+ users through 6 user research methods
Each user research method focused on the solving the core issue of user retention.
6 papers analyzed
4 hours total
8 interviews
16 responses
2,267 responses
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USER RESEARCH | LITERATURE REVIEW
Existing literature showed us that the medical kiosk boom in the US has a critical flaw: A systemic neglect of user experience
We analyzed 6 peer reviewed papers and noted the key findings.
Here's what we learned:
The medical/health kiosk market is experiencing robust growth, projected to reach $1.8B by 2028.
(Grand View Research)
Usability evaluations were reported in only 20.1% of academic papers on health kiosks.
(Maramba et al)
Virtually no studies on medical kiosks assessed adherence to accessibility standards.
(Bhutani et al)
Research in adjacent fields, such as mobile health apps, shows that UX is a key factor in driving adoption and usage.
(Lemon et al)
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USER RESEARCH | FIELD OBSERVATIONS
To gain a deeper perspective of how users interact with these kiosks we observed users interacting with the kiosk at select Walmarts. We developed a semi structured protocol for these sessions and asked users some questions after their sessions.
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USER RESEARCH | CONTEXTUAL INTERVIEWS
We conducted contextual interviews with 8 users, each lasting around an hour. This gave us a chance to go in depth into user preferences and understand their choices.
We analyzed our findings from the observations and contextual interviews on to an affinity maps to gather insights from our qualitative data:
Users are concerned about sharing personal information and too many steps in the process discourages use
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USER RESEARCH | KIOSK SIMULATION SURVEY
Users choose Guest option because they are not sure how long signing up will take
We simulated the kiosk interface on a survey and tracked where users tend to tap to learn more about user behavior.
USER RESEARCH | USER PREFERENCE SURVEY
Pursuant helped us deploy an exit survey to 500 random kiosks across the nation where we got a large sample size of 2000+ responses to understand user preferences.
Users feel more confident entering information
on their phones.
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COMPETITIVE & COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
We analyzed Pursuant's key competitor, Higi and analyzed McDonalds' kiosks and Withings, a health tracking app.
Competitors heavily use persuasive language to motivate users and push opportunities to create an account once users have experienced the benefit of the service.
DESIGN DECISIONS
We made 5 design decisions based on the findings from our research
Our design implications were based on key user needs like need for privacy, efficiency, and trust.
The redesign must show the users that the information they enter is in return for something of value to them
DESIGN SYSTEM
The design system was based on Pursuant's brand colors for familiarity, but had a focus on enhanced user feedback, readable fonts, and general visual hierarchy based on priority
SKETCHES & PROTOTYPES
Initially, we brainstormed concepts, created sketches and tested those with users.
EVALUATION
We evaluated our final prototypes with 3 industry experts and 4 users using the cognitive walkthrough framework and System Usability Score (SUS) metrics
REFLECTIONS
Explore our final design on Figma:
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