CASE STUDIES
2019
Increase in ease of use, clarity and availability of information*
*as measured by pre- and post-launch surveys
HealthEquity is a health-benefits company that manages health savings accounts (HSAs), flexible spending accounts (FSAs), and other types of reimbursement accounts. After member account holders have accumulated a certain amount of savings in their HSA, they can invest the excess in a set list of funds. When it initially rolled out, a reminder was shown on the member's account dashboard, where investing is a top-level page navigation item.
PROBLEM
Client Services representatives initially reported a lot of excitement among employers and members about being able to make better use of their HSA funds and see some accelerated account growth. Despite this original excitement, however, at launch there was a disproportionately low number of signups compared to other products. Analytics showed a significant bounce rate during onboarding, mostly during the first two or three pages of the process. Clearly there was something about the onboarding process that wasn't resonating with the members.
Investment dashboard before redesign
RESEARCH METHODS
With the help of Member and Client Services representatives, Customer Experience teams, and other members of the UX team, we dove into uncovering the root of the problem. We launched surveys to solicit targeted feedback at multiple points during onboarding, conducted user and client interviews, and and even sent out email questionnaires after completion just to catch those who may have wanted to leave the process, but powered through anyway.
Site surveys
Email questionnaires
User interviews
INSIGHTS
Digging carefully through the analytics and collected feedback, we uncovered several key insights:
Most users are investment beginners with little to no investing experience
Most users who clicked the investment banner did so out of simple curiosity to learn more
Of those who clicked, almost all found the process immediately intimidating, with lengthy terms of service at the very first, followed by pages of dense financial data and unfamiliar terms
OPPORTUNITIES
I theorized that the best way to drive an increase in onboarding completion would be to simplify the entire onboarding experience, focusing on members who are far more likely to have no prior experience with investing. This could include:
IDEATION AND ITERATION
We relied heavily on the expertise of the investment product managers who had more experience in that space. This collaboration proved invaluable when starting to frame the process, improving empathy for investing members, whether beginners or experienced investors.
We spent the first couple of sessions on paper and whiteboards, then I put together some initial ideas in Sketch to give us a starting point. The first goal to follow was decreasing the number of pages to two and simplifying the language wherever possible.
Some early notepad sketches exploring content strategy
Early testing showed positive responses, with some additional room to streamline the language. We contacted one of our biggest clients who happened to have offices close by and arrange for a series of testing sessions to make some direct observations and get on-the-spot feedback.
After another couple of rounds of design working closely with internal stakeholders, we came to a much more straightforward design that accommodated both inexperienced and expert investors alike.
The updated plan selection, fund setup, and dashboard scrrens
LESSONS LEARNED
The biggest challenge by far with this project was trying to align the most straightforward language possible with specific language requirements from our Compliance and Legal departments. Their responsibility was of course to make sure that we followed our SEC regulations, and so any UX language had to fall within those guidelines.
The end result spoke for itself with a huge increase in completion rate and a vastly decreased average completion time. Some key takeaways:
Collaboration is key
A broad collaboration with stakeholders across many departments was key to making the new onboarding process a success. Without the help of internal investment, compliance, legal, and customer experience experts, we couldn't have delivered the end result that we did.
Test everyone
Testing with participants from all across the spectrum of investing experience was critical to find a solution to meed the needs of both.