The Opportunity
In early 2019, Melon was selected to be part of a new Ministry of Health initiative, delivered by Tu Ora Compass Health PHO across the Greater Wellington area. The initiative, called Piki, aimed to provide 18–25-year-olds with mild-to-moderate mental health conditions faster access to age-appropriate support.
At the time, Melon’s platform wasn’t specifically designed for this age group. To meet the initiative’s goals, we needed to:
- Develop a new program of multimedia resources
- Make UX improvements to our product to better engage younger users
My Role
As Head of Design at a small SaaS company, I had to balance leadership, strategy, and hands-on execution. For this project, my role spanned:
- Planning & strategy – collaborating with stakeholders to define the approach
- Research & user insights – conducting surveys, interviews, and usability testing
- Design & implementation – directing the design team while working closely with developers
- Team leadership – supporting and guiding my team through tight timelines and limited budgets
Given the Ministry’s urgency to launch a pilot as soon as possible, we had to maximise research value within a small initial budget while ensuring meaningful impact.
Step One – Research
A colleague and I designed and executed a research program that included:
- Surveys to gather broad insights
- User interviews to explore real needs and pain points
- Usability testing to validate early ideas
From this, we created an initial set of wireframe concepts, helping us determine:
- The types of resources that would be most valuable
- The UX changes needed to better engage 18–25-year-olds
Step Two – Concept Development & Implementation
Our research showed that a major redesign of the resources section in Melon’s web and mobile apps was necessary.
To ensure early collaboration and alignment, we:
- Reported back key findings to stakeholders, developers, and testers
- Worked with the wider team to develop initial concepts for the redesigned resources section
- Conducted user testing to refine the designs before full implementation
Alongside these product changes, we also provided critical insights to our clinical team, helping shape new content specifically tailored to our target age group.
Step Three – Ongoing Optimisation
To ensure continuous improvement, we embedded comprehensive analytics tracking into the initial release.
Post-launch, we:
- Analysed user behaviour data
- Conducted additional user testing & interviews
- Released multiple iterative updates based on our findings
This data-driven, user-focused approach allowed us to continually refine the experience, ensuring Piki provided real value to its target audience.
