A milestone is an extrinsic motivator to boost the end users motivation. It's a green block of content with a checkmark icon. As an intervention developer you can add milestones anywhere, but we advise you to think about the placement carefully (see guidelines below).
You add a milestone by clicking the green checkmark icon at the bottom of the left menu. The text-content of a milestone is adjustable. A milestone has a title and a text area. It focuses on something the user has achieved and consists of a title summary of what the client has done and a description that goes into more detail.
Guidelines for using milestones
- Always define a title in a milestone because it is the title of the page.
- Keep a milestone short and clear. Try not to use more than 3 lines with more than 12 words per line.
- Only offer a milestone once the user has had the opportunity to achieve something, like working on an exercise, listening to an audio or understanding something difficult.
- Don't make assumptions for the end user. So don't write: "you are now completely relaxed', because you can't be sure this is the case. If you assume the end user experiences a specific feeling of success and he doesn't, he may end up feeling disappointed or unsuccessful because of the milestone. That's not what we want, we don't want to encourage the end user to continue.
- Instead, focus on a concrete step being made, even if it's a small step. For example: you've practised with a relaxation exercise, you've listed your fears, etc.
User tests show that the timing of a milestone is very important. Especially when you offer a milestone too early, people can get annoyed ('what did I really achieve by reading this one page?'). It has to feel like an actual achievement for it to be rewarding. In order to ensure this, decide beforehand which chapters in your module are going to end with a milestone.