Conveying Investment Progress on Coinbase
Role:
Product and Content Designer
Timeline:
Feb-May ‘22 (12 weeks)
Responsibilities:
Research, Strategy, Design, Content
Overview
Coinbase is an online platform for buying, selling, and storing cryptocurrency. New crypto investors begin their investing journey with a strong desire to grow their capital, but often lose motivation and give up easily. I designed a way to convey investment progress, motivating new crypto investors to take the necessary steps to grow their capital on Coinbase.
I worked on this project with the guidance of my product design mentor, Jennifer Wong.
Hypothesis
New crypto investors have the desire to grow their capital but lose motivation and give up easily
People are eager to invest in crypto, but often have a get-rich quick mindset which leads to unrealistic expectations. When those expectations aren’t met, people lose motivation to continue growing their capital and stop investing on Coinbase - negatively impacting engagement and user retention on Coinbase’s investing product.
I conducted user research to gain insights on how people make investment decisions and discovered three pain points people experience when making investment decisions.
Pain points:
Lack of confidence to invest because of not having enough knowledge, so people make in uninformed decisions.
Lack of context on why numerous steps are involved when buying crypto on Coinbase, which demotivates people from following through.
People don’t reach their investment goals in their expected timeframe and stop investing because they don’t see their expected returns.
Ideation
Sketching ways to convey progress and impact investing behavior
When exploring ideas to convey investment progress, I was deciding between giving users the flexibility to define their goals and providing informational content upfront.
Implementation
Combining Badges and Investment Insights
For my final design, I went with badges and insights because action and input from users are not required to view any investment progress. I included a call-to-action at the bottom of the insights card, where people can set up recurring investments.
When I conducted usability testing, my goal was to evaluate how people feel about badges and whether the investment insights provided are sufficient.
Top Findings From Usability Testing:
⟡ Badges and milestones catch peoples attention
⟡ People feel a sense of accomplishment when seeing how long they’ve had their portfolio
⟡ Lightweight insights are not overwhelming
⟡ People are curious about dollar cost averaging
Impact
Increased engagement and user retention
Once people gain the motivation to continue investing, new investors will take the necessary steps to grow their capital and reach their personal financial goals. As a result, Coinbase will retain users and see increased engagement with their investing product.
*Note: This is an overview of the project. Please contact me for the full case study.