AI-powered subscription platform connecting content, community, and commerce

This U.S.-based wellness and education company empowers individuals to improve their health through evidence-based digital programs, expert-led courses, and community engagement. Its mission blends wellness education with behavioral science, helping members make sustainable lifestyle changes through structured learning and continuous support. The brand serves a nationwide audience through its subscription-based model, combining E-commerce, content, and coaching into one connected experience.

Before the rebuild, the company’s digital ecosystem had become a patchwork of disconnected parts. Its Shopify-based store handled payments, a standalone LMS delivered courses, and a separate community app managed member discussions. None of these systems communicated effectively, forcing users to maintain multiple logins and making cross-platform data nearly impossible to reconcile.

This fragmentation created real consequences. Members struggled to access content, course progress wasn’t synced with subscriptions, and support teams were overwhelmed with basic requests. For staff, routine operations, like pausing subscriptions, updating lesson materials, or launching new content, required manual coordination between marketing, development, and support. Besides, leadership lacked clear visibility into user engagement or conversion performance, limiting their ability to make data-driven decisions.

Our collaboration began with a discovery phase that brought together the client’s marketing, operations, and product teams. Through stakeholder interviews and user journey mapping, we defined how content, subscriptions, and community features should connect across one experience. This stage clarified the need for a headless architecture that could power the storefront, learning system, and membership portal under one data layer, maintaining flexibility for future growth.

From there, we designed and implemented three core solutions that now operate as one ecosystem.

Rebuilding the platform with a headless architecture

We restructured the website using a headless setup with Next.js on the frontend and Sanity CMS as the content layer connected through a unified API gateway. This allowed editors to manage content and commerce assets from a single interface, while ensuring high performance and SEO visibility. Dynamic modules for courses, products, and member content replaced static pages, making it easy to update offerings or launch new programs in minutes.

Centralizing subscriptions and learning experiences

To unify transactions and learning, we replaced the fragmented subscription flow with a single membership engine built around Shopify’s Storefront API. Subscriptions, renewals, and proration are now managed directly within the headless framework. The system integrates with the LMS through SSO, allowing members to move seamlessly between checkout, courses, and progress tracking, all from one account dashboard.

Introducing an AI-powered virtual program assistant

We developed an AI assistant to guide members through their wellness journeys. Built on a retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) model, the assistant uses verified educational materials and product data to answer questions, suggest learning paths, and recommend safe program combinations. Guardrails such as content provenance, restricted topics, and a clear “Not medical advice” disclaimer ensure compliance and user trust.

Why these technologies

We selected a headless approach to separate the front-end experience from back-end services, allowing the client to scale without replatforming. Sanity provided real-time collaboration for content editors, while Shopify’s APIs ensured reliable subscription handling. The AI layer was intentionally built on open and extensible frameworks, enabling transparent, compliant, and continuously improving guidance. Together, these choices created a flexible, maintainable ecosystem ready to grow with the client’s digital strategy.

The new subscription ecosystem transformed how the organization delivers its wellness and education programs. Members now log in once to access everything – from digital courses to community discussions and personalized content recommendations. What used to feel like three separate tools now functions as a seamless platform that encourages daily engagement, drives retention, and builds long-term loyalty.

For the client’s internal team, the shift to a headless structure and unified data model simplified operations dramatically. Content updates are handled in minutes, campaign performance is visible in real time, and member analytics provide clear insights into which programs drive recurring revenue. With the AI assistant providing support for discovery and safe guidance, the support burden decreased while engagement grew consistently across all membership tiers.

Our partnership is now focused on evolution rather than maintenance. Together, we’re planning to expand the platform with goal-based program tracks, multilingual content delivery, and deeper personalization for each member’s wellness journey. The roadmap also includes extending the AI assistant’s capabilities to support interactive check-ins and coach escalation, helping the organization provide a more human, guided experience at scale.