Company   The Washington Post

Role  Strategy + Design + User Research

Habit Tiles

To address the lack of personalization within The Washington Post app, I led the design of a personalized Habit Tile feature aimed at dynamically surfacing users’ most-loved content and destinations. The goal was to help users build habits, increase engagement, and create a tailored content discovery experience.

The problem

The Washington Post’s app presented every user—including its core base of subscribers—with the same set of content and features, regardless of their individual interests or habits. This meant that users had to work hard to find the content they loved most, and even after prolonged engagement, the app did not learn or adapt to better serve their preferences.

Solution

This lack of personalization presented a clear opportunity: by introducing a prominent feature that dynamically responded to users’ behaviors, we could better surface relevant content, thereby driving habit formation and increasing overall engagement.

Process

1. Define the data

To enable personalization, I collaborated with product, engineering, data science and anlytics teams to understand what data we have available. Together, we defined a set of rules that would power the tiles, determine who saw them and when. Extensive pressure testing ensured scalability across various content types and placements, making Habit Tiles a seamless and engaging part of the app’s navigation experience for every unique user.

2. Build a flexible system

I designed a dynamic Habit Tile system that surfaced users’ favorite content in a visually clear and accessible way. Each tile included a primary label, contextual information, an image for recognition, and optional indicators like progress bars and live markers. This ensured that users could easily recognize and interact with their most relevant content at a glance

3. Test and refine

During our beta launch, I conducted multiple rounds of user research with internal users, including newsroom editors and journalists, to gather initial feedback. We then expanded testing to real users, using insights to refine our approach. To scale feedback collection, we also implemented a survey to gather data on user experience and sentiment. These research efforts directly influenced the direction of the project, ensuring that Habit Tiles met user needs and enhanced engagement.

The results

The Habit Tile feature led to significant improvements in key engagement metrics. We increased average active days and week-over-week return rate. Daily click-through rates also improved over time as we adjusted the alogorithm and design.

These results marked the first time a personalization feature positively influenced habit-related metrics within the app. The success of Habit Tiles demonstrated the value of personalization and laid the foundation for future enhancements in user engagement and content discovery.

Full case study available upon request