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During the pandemic, Vanguard saw a surge in clients trying to take charge of their investment portfolios to take advantage of stock market gains. Clients had to decide how they want their dividends and capital gains reinvested - and in doing so had to utilize unintuitive legacy systems.
Modernize dividend and capital gains flow to elevate the user experience of over 6.5 milion clients, thereby reducing call volume and increasing client confidence and satisfaction in making investment transactions.
The first step in modernizing dividend and capital gains flow was to study who are we designing for. To get to know our clients better, we gathered data on clients who recently updated their dividend and capital gains distribution. Using this information, I then compiled multiple personas of clients.
I also conducted client interviews that were crucial to understanding client' paint points, needs, and wants. We used this data to establish performance benchmarks within the current system. Our analysis revealed critical issues with the legacy flow - only 34% client found it easy to use, and just 77% of clients were able to successfully complete it.
During this research process, I found that clients that recently updated their dividend and capital gains elections were younger investors who lacked confidence and struggled with making sound investments. This resulted in clients predominately preferring to transfer their capital gains and dividends to their bank instead of reinvestment.
After my initial research and interviews, I wrote out all the data on sticky notes and organized them into categories. This helped me get a better overview of all the information gathered and helped uncover some key pain points for my users.
I observed three major themes emerged as root causes of various pain points described by the users during interviews. These insights clearly outlined gaps in the current system and also presented opportunities for improving the legacy business process..
While clients who used this flow had a good understanding of investments, they lacked guidance and were therefore afraid to complete the flow. It was clear that clients needed advice on what to do with their dividend and capital gains.
Clients had hard time following two flows in one system
After researching user needs, it was important to conduct a full audit of the entire legacy application and business processes. The purpose of this audit was to understand exactly where the complexity originated within the legacy application. The legacy system was supported by a complex back end architecture where data from multiple databases came together to support the legacy business process. This resulted in long wait times and a terrible user experience.
Workshop
I also conducted a workshop with our product owner, UX team, developers, and internal experts which gave us an opportunity to walk in the shoes of clients to holistically understand current state journey. This workshop informed the creation of a North Star vision for the modernized system.
After an exhaustive research process, it was time to synthesize the data and ideate on solutions. To do this, I went through multiple sessions of 'How Might We' activities and identified many changes that would simplify the unnecessary complexity of the legacy process.
Competitive Analysis
After researching and gathering user requirements, I wanted to take a closer look at Vanguard's competitors and analyze how they were helping their users. Through my research I identified top direct and indirect competitors within the industry, including Fidelity, Robinhood, Charles Schwab, and ETrade. The insights gained here provided key information in terms of the strengths I wanted to build upon and the weaknesses I wanted to avoid - all while keeping user goals in mind.
User Flow
To better grasp how clients would be interacting with the key screens and features involved in this process, I created a user journey maps consisting of the main tasks that the user would be completing. Next, I expanded on the design specifications for the key screens we needed to streamline the flow. Finally, using this information, I started my process of understanding our user’s interaction with the app with task flows. These map helped me to see how our users would be completing these key tasks - what screens they would be interacting with and what actions they would be taking in a linear flow.
Using my knowledge of the client, our goals, the user journey map, and the interactions on the app while keeping the long term north star vision in mind, I began by sketching out rough ideas on paper. I quickly turned these sketches into a low fidelity design to make sure that the structure and flow of the app is intuitive for clients.
After rigorous usability testing, I began conceptualizing the dividend and capital gains flow on a visual level utilizing the Vanguard design system. I wanted a minimalist design; since users often perceive an aesthetically simple design as design that's more usable. Keeping the UI simple also gave plenty of room for my team to grow UI into North Star vision in future. I used grey and white as the backdrop while blue highlighted call-to-action elements. Colors and illustrations were also used on specific elements to help guide clients so key features aren’t overlooked and attract necessary attention.
The Dividend and Capital Gains Election app, launched in 2022, has transformed the experience for over 6.7 million Vanguard clients. Its success is highlighted on Vanguard's profile and account settings main page. This new app increased the client satisfaction rate to 88%, up from 34%, as shown in post-completion surveys. Additionally, it helped Vanguard save money by significantly reducing customer care call volume.
Nielsen’s Heuristics Evaluation
After mid fidelity prototypes were completed, I hosted heuristics evaluation session where my team went through the interface several times and inspected various elements and compared them with the 12 heuristic principles. This exercise caught minor usability issues early on while optimizing usability of my design.
Data Driven UX
The data we collected gave us a clearer picture into Vanguard's users' behavior. It also empowered us to make design decisions like including 'Copy to capital gains' or 'Add a bank' modals within our flow.
Design Thinking Process
Throughout this project, I learned the importance of really diving into studying the existing design and flow of the application to envision a simplified front end process. The more time I spent in research, the less time I had to iterate on designs.
