Three Days with My Lumo Lift
I just received my Lumo Lift, a device that helps the wearer improve their posture and tracks physical activity. For my first few days with the Lift, I wrote down some thoughts on packaging, OOBE, instructions, the app, and (physical) product experience.
Packaging
The box that it came in was made of thin plastic. The kind that cuts you back if you cut it. It’s like getting into a ghetto fight; no one gets out unscathed. Aesthetically, it’s not exactly stunning packaging. I think it actually degrades the product’s perceived value. Moreover, the graphic design on the box was off-center. This was obviously a design choice and not an accident (I think?), but it struck me as odd given that this is a device to remind people to sit straight. Good design is thoughtful and true to its essence. In that respect, this particular design choice seemed at odds with the product’s purpose.
OOBE (Out of the Box Experience)
When I opened up the package, there were little doo-dads everywhere. I took off the top piece, with its familiar oval shape, recognizing this as the Lift. The charger was also obvious enough, but the rest of the pieces started to baffle me. I immediately began to try to remove all the pieces, but some of them were glued down. I pried one of them off with a little more effort than I thought necessary. I turned it around and it had a huge glob of glue stuck to the back of it. Fine, I thought… someone was a little overzealous with the glue gun I guess, no big deal. As I moved through removing more pieces, I quickly came to realize that some of them were just magnets used to hold the “real” pieces in place. Confusingly, one of the “real” pieces also had the same square magnet piece attached to it. Now I had about 6 little pieces of things and a tiny bit of panic set in that I had removed all of this without reading the instructions, and what if I can’t put it back together later? Was there some specific configuration that I needed to have this in? Crap. I root around for the little book and rip it open. It didn’t help much.
The Booklet
Where was the page that told me what all the pieces were for? This page doesn’t exist. The first page attempts to tell me about the button functions, the light statuses, and the buzz patterns. As a design choice, this struck me as odd given that people (in left to right reading countries anyway) tend to read these little booklets from left to right, and the first page should give the user instructions on how to quickly get started using the product. IMO, page one should have been: What’s all this stuff we gave you. How does it all work together? You need to charge it for two hours before you can use it, so in the meantime download the app you’ll need (it doesn’t mention the app at all).
The 3rd and 4th pages talk about how to wear the Lift. It’s only after careful reading of these 2 pages and squinting to make out the illustrations that I realize one of the pieces is for my bra strap.
Pages 5 and 6 talk about getting a “snapshot” every time I wear Lift (to calibrate it) and starting a “PowerUp” session. This is a very small book and I’m already a little exhausted with the jargon. I think someone in the marketing or writing departments might have had a little too much time on their hands to be cutesy. I’m not a 12 year old girl or a eXtreme cliff jumper. I don’t need cutesy and I don’t need to “PowerUp”. I just need clear instructions so I can sit straight.
And that’s the end of the book. Somewhere in there was a page with a pacemaker warning and the warranty details that fell out. I ignored it and thought it odd that it wasn’t just part of the booklet. The back cover of the booklet had tiny text with extremely poor contrast. Ants walking over it would have said, “Woh, are those ants?” Again, just poor design execution.
Charging It
The charger is nice, cute. It’s also magnetized (every piece that came with the Lift seems to be magnetized) so when you put it next to something you’ll be reminded of the mysteries of magnets, but it seems unnecessary.
Setting It Up
Again, no instructions on this, so I wing it. I knew I needed the app so I download it. I wonder if my parents would have known to do that. I press the button a few times to see if anything happens and when it doesn’t I revert to the sparse instructions, searching for anything that might give me a clue. I read something about bluetooth. Ahhh, right. Ok, sync it. I enable bluetooth my phone and wait. Searching… nothing. I make sure the Lift is turned on and do it again. Searching… nothing. Do I need to keep the button down? Do I need to click it once, twice, three times a lady? What do I need to do to get this thing to sync? Bluetooth detection feels like a game of luck. The Lift is sitting in my hands buzzing like it’s trying to send me a message in Morse Code. Was that 3 buzzes in a row or 3 individual buzzes? I’m not sure. What is it Lassie? Timmy fell in a well? Still I cannot connect the thing to my phone.
The next day, I start again pressing buttons and it does finally connect. Yippie! The app starts to walk me through the set-up process that was not in the booklet. This was good, and my Lift is officially working. I put it on and give it a go.
Product Design
The device is small, lightweight, and slick. I really like the little magnetic squares that keep the Lift in place on your clothes. My only gripe is that after touching the shiny side for 2 seconds, it looks like I dropped it on a cheeseburger (this may not be the case with the other color options), but since it will be worn on the inside, I guess that doesn’t matter much. The little magnetic squares are a matte silver and black, and doesn’t show finger smudges.
The device lights up in blue, green, and orange to indicate (respectively) that it’s connecting to the app, that the battery level is above 15%, and the battery level is under 15%. I wonder if this isn’t an accessibility issue, and why 3 different colors are even necessary given that the blue light would only show up on first time use — could have just pulsed the green. But I digress.
Wearing It, Day One (At Home)
Well apparently I’m the slouchiest, because after wearing it for about an hour, I had to take it off; it was just buzzing too much. Granted, I was cleaning the house, so I was leaning over every few seconds to pick things up, but the Lift did not like that at all and was incessantly buzzing me. It might be nice for it to have a bit more of a delay, in case I was moving, and not slouching. I took it off and decided that I would try it again when I was sitting in the office. Maybe it’s better suited to remind me when I’m 99% stationary.
Wearing It, Day Two (Driving)
Had to do a lot of driving today, and was wearing a T-shirt (snug, but not skin-tight — Lift suggests you don’t wear it with loose clothing). Again, I had to take it off in about 10 minutes because it was just buzzing too much while I was driving. Even when I had my back to the seat so I knew I wasn’t slouching, it was still incessantly buzzing. If I had to describe the Lift so far, it would be my mom as a wearable. It nags me to the point where I just want to scream “All right! I get it!” and storm off somewhere to collect myself.
Wearing It, Day Three (In the Office)
I have to admit I was a little hesitant to put it on today, because I didn’t want it to be buzzing incessantly, but it’s on, and I’m sitting straight, and we’re friends again. The only times that it has buzzed me is when I am actually slouching, and when I reach forward to grab a pen or drink. Again, I think this is where the sensitivity and/or time allotment could be adjusted. If someone is going to slouch, they are probably going to do it for longer than 2 seconds, so a buzz in that case is timely and relevant. Buzzing too much will create satiation, and eventually erode its usefulness.
The App
According to the app, I’m both slouchy AND inert. What a wonderful combination. I’ll be sure to add that to my Twitter bio and online dating profiles. “Hi, I’m shaped like the letter “C”, and I like long walks on the beach and laying down on the ground, lifeless, for hours at a time.”
If I start feeling bad about this though, I can head over to “Coach”, which doesn’t seem to do much except give me compliments and encouragement. (Tell me I’m a pretty pretty princess!) Beyond this, I’m not really seeing the point of the coach. Maybe I just like coaches that push me to be better. How about a sitting straight challenge? Can I do it for a whole hour? Two? But if you wanna tell me I’m a rockstar, that’s cool too I guess.
Update: The folks at Lumo have informed me that only during an active coaching session (you can set the duration for minutes or hours) will the Lift buzz you; the rest of the time, the Lift passively tracks your posture and activity. This was a completely different mental model than I had going in — I assumed the Lift was just something you were supposed to wear all day, and it would tell you if you were slouching, without having to set up a coaching session. Again, I think better information/instructions upfront would have helped align expectations.
Overall
I like it, but I don’t yet love it. So far I have learned to not wear it in the car or while I’m moving around. It works well when I’m stationary, which is when I’d be slouching most of the time anyway, so that’s good.
Has my posture improved? I’m not sure. I think it has, but it might just be a product of being more mindful of my posture (I correct myself now even without the Lift).
Summary
- Clearly they’re still in early stages, but there are some easy things they can fix to drastically improve the OOBE experience. More sophisticated packaging and clearer instructions come top of mind.
- Nobody likes magnets more than I do (except maybe Edward Leedskalnin), but that was a little excessive. On the bright side, I now have extra fridge magnets.
- Improve the written instructions on the bluetooth synchronization and the connection between the physical product and the app, to set expectations, and put the user at ease from the get-go. The first few minutes they have with your product are important.
- One side of the Lift is made of shiny material (I can’t tell if it’s metal or plastic), but it looks disgusting 3 seconds after you touch it because of all the finger marks. Product designers for Lift: Consider using the same matte silver metal you use on the magnets. No finger smudges. Classier. If you don’t want to deal with this, I guess just order a different color option.
- I don’t know how they calibrate the sensitivity, but it needs some fine tuning. It is too sensitive to motions that are not slouching, which will gradually mitigate the effectiveness of the product because people will either stop wearing it, or stop reacting to the buzzes. For it to be effective, it has to be infrequent enough to be novel, and precise.
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