Loan finder
Helping People Navigate and Choose the Best Loan Options
Client
The loan finding service is designed to help people find the best loan type with ease. With a user-friendly and convenient interface, user can quickly locate loan terms across all existing banks. Additionally, the service aims to reduce overpayment, giving people the opportunity to save money. It's the perfect solution for anyone looking to get the most out of their money and buy more while paying less.
Challenge
When searching for a loan, people may overlook banks with the most favourable terms or even be unaware of their existence. This can lead to missed opportunities for both the bank and the potential client. The client may end up selecting a loan with unsatisfactory rates, while the bank loses out on the potential client. The challenge is to build a fast and reliable service that can assist users in finding a loan that meets their needs and preferences.
Achievements
All UX activities were successfully completed during the research phase and provided us with valuable insights and opportunities for improvement.
Role
UX/UI Designer
Year
2018
Tools
Sketch, InvisionApp
Team
Me
Methods
UX Design, Concept, Storyboarding, Prototyping, User Testing
False
Problem statement
User side
A user may be unaware that they have selected the best loan option.
Bank clients are often not presented with a comprehensive view of loan propositions. Some banks provide information in a way that makes it easy to miss nuances of lending, leading to large overpayments.
Some banks do not provide overpayment calculations on their websites.
With different information provided by each bank, clients must keep track of everything on their own.
Users want a simple and fast search process.
Business side
The time it takes for bank’s clients to clarify all details can make them hesitant to take out a loan
Smaller banks with better loan propositions may go unnoticed among larger banks.
Process
Competitor Review
Competitor analysis is based on the user’s needs. I did market analysis, picked four competitors, divided them into Direct/Indirect and compared their functionality.
Standalone services which help to find the best loan type in banks don't exist in Ukraine, but such services as finance.ua and minfin.com.ua provide this functionality as a small part of the whole system. Also, two more competitors were chosen as two of the most popular services from other countries, which gave me understanding about that type of services.
I conducted a competitor analysis based on the user's needs. After doing market research, I picked four competitors and categorized them as Direct/Indirect. I then compared their functionality to determine their strengths and weaknesses.
In Ukraine, standalone services that specifically help users find the best loan types in banks do not exist, but some general finance services like finance.ua and minfin.com.ua provide this functionality as a small part of their overall systems. Additionally, I analyzed two popular loan-finding services from other countries to gain a better understanding of this type of service.
User Interviews
To get a deep understanding of the users who would use this service, I conducted interviews with 5 people who had experience in getting a loan for different needs (buying a car, apartment, goods). It's crucial to interview people with different backgrounds and professions to understand their own needs and goals.
Result: 5 respondents, 3 skype sessions and 2 offline sessions.
Persona
I got many insights and pain points after the interviews, the next step was to create personas that highlight key points and the needs of potential users. They define the main scenarios of using the product and possible cases of interactions with it.
Value Proposition Canvas
The Interviews and Personas gave me a list of ideas, but I needed to ensure that the future product was related to the customer's values and needs, I used the Value Proposition Canvas tool to ensure it and prioritise features. Also, it helped to figure out the main issues and possible solutions.
Customer Journey Map
Based on Personas and VPC I defined the current customer journey. CJM showed how the path was difficult and long for the people who want to take a loan. I applied possible solutions to the current CJM and created an ideal CJM
Current CJM
Ideal CJM
Scenarios, Navigation and User Flow
All my findings from the previous steps let me create scenarios for user flows for loan search process and notifications. There are some user stories below.
#1
As a person who wants to take a loan for a car, I want to find a suitable loan proposition using filtering options, so that I don't have to look through many loan propositions to find what suits me best
#2
As a person who wants to take a loan for a car, I want to compare loans terms that I pick from a list, so that I can choose a loan that suits me best
#3
As a person who took a loan I want to set up notifications about monthly payments, so that I will not miss a payment
Prototypes and Usability Testing
I designed prototypes according to the user flows to test their usability on potential users. For the usability testing phase, I selected the main features and defined hypotheses that I wanted to validate. My goal was to clarify any elements of the interface that were unclear and discover how users interacted with the prototypes. I conducted usability tests with InvisionApp and gathered feedback from several potential users. Based on the results, I identified areas where I could improve the user flow and made adjustments accordingly.
Script for chosen user flows:
#1
Imagine that you need to get a loan, but you don't have any idea which loan propositions are able to be provided by banks in your city. Try to discover loan propositions using the loan aggregator, then choose the best propositions for you and try to apply for a loan.
#2
Imagine that you have found several beneficial propositions, try to compare them
Takeaways
Never stop seeking knowledge
This project was both incredibly challenging and rewarding for me, as it provided the opportunity to explore various methods of the UX process. Throughout this journey, I gained valuable insights into research, testing, and more.
Designing with empathy
Through this learning project, I developed a deeper empathy for users and gained insights into their needs. As a designer, I’ve learned just how important it is to pay attention to feedback and observations to improve both the design and the user experience.