ConJoin —a finance app for couples
Design case study about bringing joy and simplicity to tracking shared finances
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Does “talking money” in your relationship make you feel uncomfortable? Have you ever gotten into a fight over your partner’s spendings? We’re here to help.
Challenge: “Conceptualize and design a finance tracking app.”
For this conceptual design project, I partnered with my dear Ironhack colleague Katja Margulis — a talented UI/UX (former graphic) designer from Berlin.
Because this design was done from scratch, our starting point was to wonder for what kind of app there actually is a demand out there?
The question could only be answered by one: Our user.
UX Research
I went onto the treasure hunt for a problem. I created a survey to find out:
- Which demographic group
- does share what kind of finances
- with whom exactly
- in which kind of situations?
The survey results showed that our users were (young) adults in their 30s with a steady income. For them, sharing finances was mainly a private matter — as opposed to sharing finances for professional reasons, for example with business partners (< 10%).
There were not only two specific contexts, when people would share finances, but concludingly also two very specific target groups:
People either shared finances in group situations with friends (52%, e.g. traveling together, eating out, buying presents) or in their relationship with their partners (63%, e.g. for rent, insurances, household expenses, groceries and other every day expenses).
Some of our survey participants already named apps they were already using for tracking shared finances (e.g. Tricount, Splitwise, or Steven). Taking a closer look at them, you could see that they covered a pretty general audience and offered manyfold options for different use cases. Which meant: their features were tailored to a broad variety of people and situations. However, looking at our survey results, our participants naming these apps were mainly those users who shared their finances in groups of friends.
This is where the second target group — the couples — became especially interesting to us. To find out about an actual demand, I needed to discover their real-life pain points and, thus, the problem.
I selected a number of participants for consecutive user interviews, one partner each from a number of young couples in their 30s.
More insights
My interviewees repeatedly reported, that the topic of tracking their finances first played a role when the couple decided to build up a future together. This could, for example, be when moving in together or trying to plan future big investments like travels, getting a mortgage — or even starting a family. It was considered “a task” that needed to be done.
While doing so, I also got to know that:
- the majority of them would have one partner identifying with the role of “the organizer”, who at least initiated or generally prefers to keep an eye on the financial situation
- doing so, they rather used conventional media (e.g. notebooks or spreadsheets) than apps
- they felt, if they tried any finance apps, they were too complicated and also not individualized enough to their specific needs
- all agreed, however, was perceived as an inevitable task to be done to not end up in financial troubles
- all also agreed, that talking finances should never affect the relationship negatively and they’d be happy to have this stress outsourced
So, how might we help young couples cope with the stress and uncertainty of their financial future?
Product Definition
We decided that we wanted to give couples back the feeling of control over their finances while also making tracking them a fun task. We wanted to create a product, that generally provides a positive feeling by making them feel united in their shared goal.
So how do you design such a thing?
A competitor analysis showed, that a few apps also tried to cover this topic in some way (e.g. Honeyfi or Twine, available on the US market only). However, we wanted to differentiate our product from some key functions they offered:
- requirement of a direct link to a bank account
- focus on debt settlement between the two partners
- intention to promote direct investment into assets
We also deducted from the visual competitive analysis, that their UIs rather went for serious, elegant, or clean looks. As you’d expect from finance apps, many of them used detailed, spreadsheet-like views and entry forms. With our visual identity, we wanted to stay more casual.
💡 Our Value Proposition:
Our product helps couples keep track of their finances in a simple, playful, and visual way.
🌟 Our Brand Attributes:
UNITED — RELIABLE — CONFIDENT — APPROACHABLE
Visual Design Process
We created three different mood boards to put our idea into visual concepts. The goal of our visual identity was to stand for a product:
- that shows that the couple is working on a goal together (united)
- that shows data understandably and is trustworthy (reliable)
- that conveys an overall positive, optimistic feeling of finances being fun while representing a shared goal (confident)
- that keeps information simple, visual and takes the role of a friendly helper (approachable)
Information Architecture
We needed to evaluate the content further before starting our first low-fidelity prototypes. To find out, how users would access information and functions in the app, we collected a wide range of what kind of finances play a role in a young couple’s life. We structured the information architecture on an affinity map and created a first sitemap to show how certain criteria were related to others, what hierarchies existed, and which details were crucial to design an MVP.
User Flow
We defined our MVP, which was to cover the most important functions: onboard users, track their expenses, and give an overview of the data provided.
Our user flow was defined by the most common use case: the tracking of everyday expenses in contextual situations.
For such situations, the path was supposed to be as quick and simple as possible. Also, we wanted to provide a directly connected option for the user to see how both partners contributed to such positions. Thus, the Quick Add function and the Split View by % came into being.
User Test
We created an interactive mid-fidelity prototype and put it into a user test to see if the flow was logical to follow.
We also included non-MVP placeholder icons in the navbar for future extension of the functions (savings and forecast).
When it came to data visualization we created first rough drafts of how finances could be displayed in relation to each other in the sense of an overview, but without creating a feeling of competition (after all, the app needed to convey that tracking finances should be something desirable, not something causing frustration).
Our example use case would be:
Splitting a bill at the restaurant & checking who spends more.
Iteration
Unfortunately, the initial user tests led to a high drop-out rate as not all paths and possible interactions were as clearly marked as thought. Our users did find the Quick Add function quickly, but then would get lost in the details of the overview.
We wanted to reassure users by giving them more feedback about the system status by direct system responses. Also, better, unambiguous copy and prominently visible CTAs were added.
We also reduced the navbar options so that there was an even clearer triad of what goes in, what goes out, and where the finances could potentially go to.
Design Result
We also added an onboarding journey that lets the user easily provide basic data for the app — if wanted.
As a result of our research, here we also included the option that the “organizer” of the relationship had either the option to already enter data of both partners and/or invite their partner to join the app.
Within the Quick Add menu, we visualized the most commonly tracked everyday expenses with playful iconography and big buttons.
Wherever finances were listed, radio buttons could change the data view by user. This was simplified by specifically only using the pronouns “shared” / “yours” / “theirs”. Creating pronouns-only copy both gave the freedom of not forcing users to enter a name, stay consistent in the design no matter on which partner's device the view would be displayed — and, moreover, stay gender-neutral and as inclusive as possible.
When comparing finances in detail, we included different, partly animated visualizations options which were kept simple and friendly to avoid the feeling of competition and rather convey the feeling of growing together.
Personal Takeaways
However friendly and simple the design turned out in the end, the most rememberable blocker during the design process certainly was building the information architecture.
With finances being a highly complex topic with numerous features and options possibly to be added, it was challenging to keep in mind the actual user demand of not wanting to be overwhelmed and keeping things usable enough for their everyday lives.
In the end we reduced a highly complex sitemap into a very basic MVP.
To give our users the simplest and most seamless experience possible, once again, less proved to be more.
— This design is a collaboration with Katja Margulis.
PROJECT SPECIFICS
2 persons design team · 9 days · Nov’ 20
MY ROLE
- UX Research, Competitor Analysis, User Survey, User Interviews
- Problem Definition, HMW, Product Strategy, Branding, Mood Boards
- User Flow, Data Visualization, Low-Fidelity to Mid-Fidelity Prototyping, Usability Testing and Validation
TOOLS
Notion, Figma, Maze
All illustrations and photographs were taken from various free sources to the best of our knowledge, and are used for demonstration purposes only.
