The challenge:
Fostering the expansion of independent businesses is a valuable opportunity for the bank to attract new clients and cultivate rewarding relationships. However, it's clear that previous solutions have fallen short in addressing the diverse needs of small and medium-sized companies.
The process:
Discovery workshop
Competitors analysis
Survey design and recruitment
Survey insights and co-design
New service proposal and wireframes
TEAM & ROLE
I worked as a lead in team with a Project Manager
PROJECT OUTCOME
Several interactive boards, a comprensive report of all the phases of the project and wireframes of the new service proposal
Discovery workshop
The NatWest "Access to Expertise" website aims to connect business owners with mentors. After launching the beta version, I conducted a thorough review of analytics and an independent usability test. This revealed two key issues: users faced choice paralysis due to numerous obscure options, and they often selected a generic route labeled "General Business Support," indicating difficulty in finding specific services.
To address these issues, I organized a discovery workshop where I presented my findings and proposed two strategies. The first involved fixing usability issues and adding advanced filters to the existing beta. The second strategy focused on gathering quantitative data to generate new ideas and improve the service.
Both NatWest and I preferred the second option because no generative research had been conducted before the launch, presenting an opportunity for innovative improvements to the "Access to Expertise" service.
Competitors analysis
For this project, I utilized competitor analysis to inspire the design. Following the brief, my focus was primarily on exploring top-tier categorization and filtering experiences, particularly regarding how mentors are matched with users and how the expertise levels of mentors are displayed.
To accomplish this, I examined over 10 competitors across various payment models (paid, free, subscription) and documented their user journeys. This served as inspiration for my design approach. I categorised the competitors into the following groups:
1-Time and location-specific services
2-Services centered around the prestige of well-known mentor figures
3-Subject-specific services
4-Gamified experiences
The analysis findings were presented using FigJam.