Envisioning the Netflix of Personal Finance
DESKTOP, MOBILE | B2C
PROJECT OVERVIEW
TIMELINE
July 2020 - February 2021
ROLE
Lead Product Designer
TEAM
Product Designer
Strategist
Chief Technology Officer
Chief Creative Officer
PLATFORM
Web
Mobile
Browser Extension
BACKGROUND
ModFi, short for Modern Finance, aims to be your one-stop shop for all things personal finance. The product aggregates a user’s bank accounts, credit cards, budget and savings goals, expenses, rewards, and even P2P transfers.
CHALLENGE
Define the feature set for ModFi’s beta launch, including defining their target market and business model.
RESULT
Financial empowerment through easy-to-use features
For seven months, I worked closely with the Chief Technology Officer, Chief Creative Officer, and Strategist doing rapid design explorations of features for the ModFi beta. This included researching competitors, conducting comparative industry analysis, and mocking up screens in 2-week sprints. Get to know the product in this video:
Cloud Wallet
The company had acquired the hardware for a near field communication (NFC) card, which would be used to aggregate all of one’s financial cards into one device. I was tasked with designing the accompanying software for managing these cards, which we called the Cloud Wallet.
ModBot
The ModBot is a chatbot that uses natural language processing to help users find what they need within the app, or to retrieve information by asking questions such as, “what were my last three transactions?” and “what are all the accounts I’ve linked to ModFi?”
Savings Goals
ModFi is on a mission to empower individuals through financial education. The savings goals feature is one of many tools to accomplish just that. Users can create a vision board and statement, set recurring contributions, and add product items to their financial goals.
Budgeting
Similar to savings goals, the budgeting feature empowers individuals by showing their budget breakdown and trends. Over time, ModFi will show insights into their habits to help individuals improve their spending habits.
Receipt Capture
Tired of the bottomless pit of receipts in your drawer? ModFi’s receipt capture uses optical character recognition (OCR) technology to scan your receipts and keep them on record for tax purposes.
Browser Extension
ModFi’s browser extension helps users make informed purchasing decisions while online shopping. The product tab shows other sellers to consider for the same product, items frequently bought together, how the user’s budget would be affected by making the purchase, and even allow the user to save the product in their savings goal. When checking out, the payment tab would recommend the best credit card to use for payment.
DESIGN SYSTEM
Infusing ModFi’s flexibility, fun, and flair for aesthetics to its design system
I collaborated with the Art Director to continuously refine ModFi’s design system, which greatly advanced my pace for creating exploratory mockups. The design system not only includes UI components but also custom-made icons and 3D illustrations.
RETROSPECTIVE
Remaining agile to an agile design process
Since ModFi is a heavily engineering-led team, I needed to adjust the traditional iterative design process to one that is in line with the company’s agile framework for development. This meant that with each two-week sprint, the focus was on designing a feasible solution, developing it, and revisiting the feature weeks later for the next round of iteration. Foreseeing that this could lead to a piecemeal experience, I continually revisited and shared the product architecture with the team to ensure we were creating one cohesive product.