goalmap – SMART goal setting to stay motivated - Interview with the developer of a fantastic app

Did you have any prior development or coding experience?

None! We created Goalmap with my elder brother, Damien, and both of us have graduated from business schools in France.

What was the most challenging aspect of developing mobile app?

We completely revamped the design of our app and its features 6 months ago. An in-depth review of our users’ behaviors on the old version of the app motivated us to remove some features, such as the forum or integration with some third-party applications (Withings, Fitbit, Strava, etc.). These features, which we thought were crucial and had been requested by our users, were in fact hardly used. It was not so simple to accept removing them, because we liked these features! We have chosen to do less, but better. And thus offering a simpler, yet more compact user experience.
We explain our choices in this blog post: https://blog.goalmap.com/en/new-version-goalmap-motivation-app/

_Goalmap

Arthur Catani, the interview, is the co-founder and marketing head at Goalmap. Goalmap helps companies take care of their employees' health several topics: nutrition, sleep, physical activity, stress management, work-life balance, psychology. Goalmap wellness coaching programs combine online wellness surveys, digital coaching via a mobile app, and human workshops.

Name a few of your favorite apps and reason you love them.

InsightTimer for meditation. It is "the largest free meditation library on Earth". Among the 24,000 meditations, there is something for every taste, meditations but also talks, relaxing music, in all languages, of all durations and for all levels. You can also set a timer for the desired duration. My brother Damienparticularlylikes Stephen Procter's meditations.

Freeletics: it’s for me the reference when it comes to fitness apps. The quality of the videos and the number of exercises make the difference. You can choose individual exercises (push-ups, jumping jacks, etc.) or follow more structured sessions, some of which are free.

Focus To-Do: the app combines the Pomodoro timer with a task planner. You can create and organize a list of things to do during sessions, and dedicate your time to focus on completing these tasks. The app also allows you to manage reminders, your agenda, and even your shopping list!

Deezer for music and podcasts (it’s a French company)

How long have you been working on this app?

The process of revamping completely the app took us approximately 7 months: user interviews, user research, new specs, user interfaces, back-end and front-end code

What need of the user did you have in mind when developing this app?

Most of us are tired of taking good resolutions that quickly abandon due to a lack of motivation. It's hard to motivate oneself to live a healthier life, a better diet, or be more productive every day. Most of our new year’s resolutions are abandoned after 2 weeks!
Goalmapis the personal development app that wants what is good for you, a real coach in your pocket to help you keep your good resolutions.

In what way do you think your app is better than similar apps on the market? Please describe in detail what innovation you think you bring and what you are proud of in your app.

Most of the similar apps on the market are goal-setting apps. We like those apps and personally I use some of them! But we feel they are missing something: they help users set and track their goals. But what if people abandon? What if they lack motivation or inspiration to reach their goals? What if they need other tools to pursue their self-realization journey? We really wanted Goalmap to be a self-help partner with podcasts, coaching videos, motivational quotes, inspirational missions.

What are your future plans and expected features of the coming new versions of this app?

We are regularly adding new coaching content on the app. 7 or 21-day programs about time management, self-help, goal-setting, sleep, work-life balance, podcasts prepared by leading experts, inspiring stories shared by our users, etc.
We want our library to help many individuals across the world to fulfill their goals and aspirations.

Assuming new users of your app are reading this page. What do you want to ask them to do (contact you about X, Share the app, etc.)?

Feel free to contact us at [email protected] and tell us what you think of the app, we like talking to our community. Of course, don’t hesitate to share our app with your friends and family if you think it can help them in their self-help journey.