Create an app for an entry-level investor geared towards the millennial market. The strategy was to eliminate the complexity of investing with simple and clear messaging for the average layman.
Background: According to CNBC “1 in 3 Americans have less than $5,000 saved for retirement”. The cost of living is soaring, there is a high percentage of people who don’t have knowledge of saving money or starting an investment. Also, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) “Nearly half of families have no retirement account savings at all.” A lot of people live paycheck by paycheck and some resort to borrowing money from high interest credit cards payday loan firms. An investment account with a professional adviser have requirements that are out of reach for many. According to Bank of America “To qualify, you must maintain total combined balances of $50,000 or more”. According to Chase Bank "The self-direct investment account needs a minimum balance: $2,500."
The App Research Plan:
Business Goal: Create personal online banking possible for low income users while educating them to make smarter decisions. Gather data to help the company understand their users for future development of products.
User Needs: Invest with minimal funds, strategize retirement plan, learn about how to spend responsibly.
Research Questions:
Online banking questions:
Q1. Do you use and trust online banking? or Finance app? (if no, not qualify for the research)
Q2. Do you have savings or do they think you save enough for current life or retirement?
Q1. Do you use and trust online banking? or Finance app? (if no, not qualify for the research)
Q2. Do you have savings or do they think you save enough for current life or retirement?
Investment questions:
Q3. Do you willing to save more for the future? (If no, not qualified for the research)
Q4. What stops or slows you for saving?
Q5. Asking permission first, what is your salary and how much do you have in savings, and in retirement accounts, how much you put in your saving or retirement account.
Q3. Do you willing to save more for the future? (If no, not qualified for the research)
Q4. What stops or slows you for saving?
Q5. Asking permission first, what is your salary and how much do you have in savings, and in retirement accounts, how much you put in your saving or retirement account.
Spending habits questions:
Q7. Before you do shopping, do you have a plan?
Q6. Are you an impulse buyer?
Q8. Do you check your monthly credit card bill and check which category you spend the most.
Q7. Before you do shopping, do you have a plan?
Q6. Are you an impulse buyer?
Q8. Do you check your monthly credit card bill and check which category you spend the most.
Methodology:
User Surveys: Understand the users’ thoughts of money. Find out their frustrations on money and what is preventing them from saving more. Find out their spending habits. Do they live from paycheck to paycheck? What is their current knowledge of investment?
User Interview: Get to know each candidate to understand their perspective. What does a typical day for them look like? Understand their level of education. What their motivations are. What obstacles are in their way? The goal of each interview is to understand enough details to have empathy for them. This will help in the user-centered design process.
Money/Finance Diary studies: (If the last 2 groups of the participants willing to provide their daily bookkeeping or banking statements) This is a great way to get to know your users’ spending habits deeply. (how many impulse purchases, how many Starbucks...)How much in and how much out. Do they save enough or not.
Focus Groups: Groups of 3–5 participants who already using a finance app or online banking app. To get their throughs of the apps they are using. Getting their throughs of saving and investing. Let them rate their apps and bullet points the pros and cons. Lead a discussion about saving/invest money. Lead a discussion about spending and saving habits.
Participants:
• Young, fresh out of school, just start a job.
• Young/Experience on the job, but have no enough savings or willing to save more.
• Worked for a few years, have small savings but not enough to go to the big banks. Willing to save more and learn more about money and investing.
• Young, fresh out of school, just start a job.
• Young/Experience on the job, but have no enough savings or willing to save more.
• Worked for a few years, have small savings but not enough to go to the big banks. Willing to save more and learn more about money and investing.
Schedule:
Week 1: Customer surveys and interviews. (Asking them willing to participate in farther studies)
Week 2: Diary studies
Week 3: Focus group 1
Week 4: Gathering the data and analyzing.
Week 1: Customer surveys and interviews. (Asking them willing to participate in farther studies)
Week 2: Diary studies
Week 3: Focus group 1
Week 4: Gathering the data and analyzing.
Storyboard:
Storyboards helps us visualize how a user may discover our product and gives us insight on how they start their experience with the product.
Empathy Map:
We create empathy maps based on UX researchers notes to help us understand our users on an emotional level. We then share these maps to our product managers and stakeholders.
Brainstorm:
We start throwing ideas on the paper through napkin sketches and whiteboards to explore ideas for potential solutions.
The App Flowchart:
Before we commit to details of the interface, we need to clarify how users can move through to accomplish their goals. We created the app flowchart to outline all the possible scenarios, options, errors, dependencies, and outcomes.
Project Part 1: Landing Page Design
At this stage, we came up with the feature list in which the app will have 3 main features:
• Set Financial Goal
• Grow Knowledge and Wealth
• Spend Smarter
• Set Financial Goal
• Grow Knowledge and Wealth
• Spend Smarter
Business Goals of the Landing Page: Encourage users to learn more about the product and sign up.
User Needs: Understand the features of the app and be able to sign up.
User Needs: Understand the features of the app and be able to sign up.
Summary:
We sent out 2 test links which were qualitative and quantitative testings after we designed the landing page to make sure the landing page met our goal. Users understood our 3 major services and successfully signed up for an account.
The Take-outs:
1. Research: User research and product research are essential. It enabled us to understand where our product fit in the market and what our potential users wanted.
2. Have a plan: Set a goal and create a plan to reach it. Follow the plan and always expect that your plan could be wrong. Being able to adapt and recorrect is important.