QUIRK
Navigating the FinTech jungle
Quirk is a London-based FinTech startup, co-founded in January 2020 by Nafeesa Jafferjee and Nikos Melachrinos. As a group of 3 design students, we were tasked to create a social feature that would boost in-app engagement.
In a hurry? Click Go to Solution to see my final product and key learnings.
SOCIAL FEATURE | 3 WEEKS
Anita Denton, Louis Schuch, Louise Aron (me)
THE BRIEF
To research, create, test and prototype a social feature in-app that allows users to share their financial goals and exchange knowledge and experience through a digital safe space.
MY ROLE
As a team, we collaborated well through agile methodologies to make sure we were all on track with our deadlines. I took the lead on: Client Communication, Affinity Mapping, UX writing, Competitive & Comparative Analysis, Presentation Synthesis and Development.
DELIVERABLES
• User & Competitor Research
• Personas & Scenarios
• User Journeys
• Information Architecture
• Design & Usability Recommendations for improvement
• User Flows & Screen flows
• Product Sketches & Wireframes
• High Fidelity Prototype
• Client Presentation
DISCOVER
Taking into account the competitive nature of the FinTech industry, this meant that we needed to narrow down our competitive research to the personal finance/budgeting sector to understand Quirk’s direct competitors.
We carried out a Plus and Deltas analysis and a feature inventory on Emma, Mint, Yolt, Nav.it and Plum. On the whole, we found that Quirk has relatively strong holding in the sector compared to its competitors. At the same time, you cannot currently invest and transfer savings with Quirk like you can with Mint, for example.
SURVEY STATISTICS
60.8%
said they felt comfortable managing their money, suggesting an already existing basic understanding of financial literacy.
28
Respondents
78.5%
would feel comfortable sharing their financial milestones with peers and the wider community.
“Seeing people of similar ages - seeing how they save, might make me want to save more.”
Survey Respondent
USER INTERVIEWS
We conducted 12 user interviews. Spanning an age range of 19-30, 25% of interviewees were already existing Quirk users.
Users want to know what their peers are doing with their money
Users have mixed feelings sharing their financial milestones
Users are either passive or active in their online behaviour
DEFINE
Problem Statements & How Might Wes?
Users need a way to exchange their financial milestones and experiences with their peers so they can reach their financial goals.
Users need a digital safe space to access relevant advice and information to navigate their financial difficulties and the wider industry.
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How might we create a platform to help users exchange and access valuable financial information?
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How might we create a digital safe space for users to share their financial journey with their peers, and help them feel secure?
Personas
With the split in insights, we thought it made the most sense to create two personas that matched both the introverted and the extroverted personality type.
Chloé - The Optimizer
Kyle - The Artist
DEVELOP
We conducted a Design Studio with the clients co-founders, using the Crazy Eights exercise, each of us created 1-2 iterations of the most popular original designs.
Sketches
DEVELOP
After having produced the sketch prototypes, we did two rounds of usability testing, with 5 different users for each round.
Some key iterations:
Simplification of Onboarding process
On the sketch prototype, there was some confusion with the UX writing on the onboarding with: “What have you achieved?” and “2K people can help you!” The purpose of this was to show that this intends to be a community where you can both exchange expertise and learn from others’.
“There aren’t going to be 2,000 people who can help me save for a flat deposit?”
Users were unsure about this aforementioned element, as it seemed more like advertising, so we altered the onboarding process for users to only set goals to achieve themselves, and then those with expertise, such as the verified advisers and more experienced Quirk users can choose to share or respond to questions within the individual communities.
Improvement of Categorisation and Information Architecture
“You’ve put short term and long term goals. Is there a reason why you split them up, or is it specific to me?”
In the Find Communities page, we changed the names of the categories. Users thought these categories were too vague and did not represent the different stages of life each user could be in. Users also expressed their need to get advice from experts as well as their peers. Therefore, we added a category within the app with a list of different Quirk verified advisers to follow, so users could keep up with the content and advice they share.
DELIVER
Click the play button to view the Hi-Fi prototype
SOLUTION
Based on the criteria of the brief, this solution meets the needs of both personas. Offering a digital safe space for users to maintain anonymity, the new community feature allows users to set goals, exchange knowledge and share their milestones.
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For Chloé, she would be active in the community tab. She would follow the Quirk verified experts to learn more about buying her first property.
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To maintain anonymity, she would use a nickname provided like Awesome Optimizer.
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Kyle would take advantage of the different communities available to him. He would benefit from hearing from users like Chloé who are further ahead in their financial journey.
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As someone who needs help being held accountable, Kyle would gain a lot of value from setting goals and sharing trophies.
NEXT STEPS
The results of this feature are yet to be implemented by Quirk. As far as we are aware, the feature will start to be put into place in October.
If we were to continue on this project, these are the next steps we would put into action:
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Add popups on on the onboarding process within app
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Create trophy view page
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Create Advisor profile page
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Adding community guidelines/reporting
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Explore further gamification
KEY LEARNINGS
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Through this process, I learnt that some of my key skills lie in client communication, my attention to detail and ability to consider the bigger picture.
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Quirk was a pleasure to work with. I learnt a lot about working with a client and the nature of working with a start up.
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Working together as a team of UX Design students brought its challenges. I learnt more about the value of teamwork and listening and taking into account other people's opinions.
CLIENT FEEDBACK
“Louise worked on a design sprint for Quirk to explore new feature development. She proved herself as an excellent project manager and an even more capable UX designer. She helped set out an initial plan and strategy, as well as, see through the execution of all the tasks. Louise has the mark of a very talented UX designer as she conducted user interviews, brainstormed and ideated concepts, and created high-fidelity prototypes. She's also very well organized in sharing the final output and handing-over of assets. Would work again with Louise in a heartbeat.”
Nikos Melachrinos - CEO and Co-Founder of Quirk