A smarter, faster approach to digital banking made for early-stage startups

Senior UX Consultant • Capco • 3 weeks for Prototype + 18 months design + implementation

This case study illustrates product thinking and vision of a future-state digital banking experience. This rapid prototype helped fueled a holistic 5 year product vision/strategy for a high-tech U.S commercial bank.

Due to NDA, the client will be referred to as Client X. I have limited and obfuscated confidential information in this case study. All information in this case study is my own and does not necessarily reflect Client X's views.

My Role

I was part of a team of five designers to help push the boundaries from what a traditional commercial banking app would do today. Having previous UX managerial skills, I was able to offer my perspective to help move the project forward and steer the team on track with a short turnaround time. We weren’t formally given any roles, but naturally I was able to assign roles to everyone where they most strongly align.

I was responsible for conceptualizing the key user journeys, differentiating features, creating wireframes and mockups.
I also owned the branding and style guide process, and set up the master sketch file for collaboration.
As part of a team, we were able to deliver a future-state prototype that redefines commercial banking.

Design Tools: Sketch, Invision, Mural
Design Methods: A mix of user interviews, concept testing, and rapid prototyping

The Client

Client X is a U.S. high-tech commercial bank for the innovation economy. We were asked to help design a consumer-like future-state commercial bank prototype for early stage startups. Our goal is to differentiate, add value, while delighting their customer base, in addition to supporting the basic banking needs that will help their businesses grow and scale.

The Challenge

Founders are looking for a way to seamlessly manage the finances of their business with minimal effort so they can focus on building their business.

Goals

Create a differentiated commercial banking digital experience to add value, while delighting existing customer base
Help startups gain business insights through real-time data
Support basic banking needs that will help startups grow and scale

Our Approach

The perfect design process doesn’t exist–each project warrants various tools, methodologies, and processes. As a seasoned designer, I have to evaluate business goals to ensure a project’s success and figure out the best solution for a design problem.

Research & Discovery

We first held a workshop to understand the client’s vision and then utilized our financial expertise and startup experience to develop the optimal user journey.

We sketched our initial ideas out to quickly gather feedback from the stakeholders and SMEs.
We also spoke to a range of users who have engaged or created their own startups. Our target audience is mostly young and tech savvy, so we wanted to create an experience that drives engagement with rich interactions that create those delightful moments.

We learned that founders want a simple way to see their financials, upcoming spend, where they have spent their money and their burn rate.

Design & Iterate

We defined a list of key moments in the founder's journey and did more research and interviews to help define user stories. We defined the value prop of each key moment of the journey from a UX perspective. We worked with the client every step of the way to validate design direction, wireframes and high-fidelity mockups.

We only had 8 days to develop a full blown prototype, so prioritization of the key moments (25+) was key. Then we started to ideate on a rapid MVP prototype to help bring to life the vision with a storytelling approach.

At this point in order to hit our deadlines, we divide-and-conquered the top key moments and began wireframing and sketching. As the lead designer, I did daily check-ins with the designers and validated the user flows before turning the sketches to mockups.

Key Moments

Milestones: Highlight and acknowledge key moments in the experience to celebrate every startup milestones.
Payments made simple: There's too many different types of payment methods.
Smart payment advice: Continuing the advisor role, we want to make sure to guide the customer at the right direction at any time.
Analytics: Based on research, our users told us that to take it a step further, we need to include visual analytics to help them make better business decisions.

Impact/Outcome

We were encouraged to push the boundaries of what traditional commercial banking apps do today. In a short amount of time, we delivered a robust customer journey and an end-to-end prototype demonstrating the happy path of the founder’s financial decision lifecycle. We were able to create an experience that feels seamless and simple–even when dealing with traditionally complex decision points.

Results

Our stakeholder was ecstatic with the final prototype and said "this was so beautiful, that I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, and it was just what our bank has been looking for.” This prototype was presented to an executive committee, where it was well-received and adopted as a driver for the future of their commercial banking strategy.

In the next two years, I was part of their core design team to help make this experience a reality.

"This was so beautiful, that I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, and it was just what our bank has been looking for"