Xavier Sedras UX Generalist
Smartlabs Smartlabs Bournemouth is FinTech startup offering a number of financial products directly to their customers, as well as giving them the best possible options available on the market today. I worked as part of the core product team, where I held the position of Senior UX Designer. I regularly exercised the breadth of knowledge I have for the full UX lifecycle during agile projects. Working as part of a start-up has great perks. One of which is taking on more responsibility within the team, allowing me to work on both UX research and design. I was also given the opportunity to work on a range of product concepts, including a budgeting application which I helped to develop from incubation through to the build phase. Here are a few of my latest journeys through typical projects.
Project:
Loan Watch Problem Finding a right finance package for your specific purpose can be stressful, and confusing. Three separate comparison brands were created, which allowed customers to make informed decisions based upon the information provided. The problem is that these brands all did the same thing, and none had done a spectacular job. The business understood its demographics, however, none of the brands were specifically dedicated to it. It seemed as if the initial launch was rushed. I was tasked with conducting UX research to find out what exactly the user’s pain points were. I would later map and design a journey which both satisfies current user pain points, as well as solve the overall business goal which is to create a good converting product.
Usage Location
Age Demographics
Smartlabs Loan Watch UX Research and Design
During the project launch phase, I was responsible for doing the analytic research, persona development, and conducting workshops initially with stakeholders and later with our users.
Smartlabs Loan Watch UX Research and Design
A lot of wireframing exploration took place in both high and low fidelities to enable us to test and improve upon ideas.
Smartlabs Loan Watch UX Research and Design
I set up user personas, as well as user scenarios for the team to better collaborate with the users in mind. I also conducted multiple qualitative testing sessions such as card sorting and remote user testing.
Prototyping
Smartlabs Loan Watch UX Research and Design
I then created fully working prototypes using Invision so that we could test it with our users, so that any pain points can be corrected and retested.
Simple, Human & Honest
Smartlabs Loan Watch UX Research and Design
By focusing on optimising each step throughout a journey with our users in mind, we have increased the total conversion rates as well as increased sales generated. This has resulted in over 55.2% more users completing the journey and 65% more sales.
Project:
Smart Coin Problem The current payment structure and process has the highest drop off within any journey, website or product. After doing some user testing, conducting remote viewing sessions of users going through the payment process I was able to determine user pain points. The users don’t feel comfortable enough to input their card details into this page and it means they cannot go to the next stage of a journey. As this is also the most important page this problem needs to be addressed. After pitching my findings to the business stakeholders, I was tasked with being the design lead, as well as doing the UX and UI work for the project.
inspectlet Remote testing
Traffic segmentation analysis
Data and trend analysis
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
I conducted remote viewing sessions through for the original payment structure to identify user pain points. I also looked at quantitative research methods, analysing data, trend, traffic sources as well as monitoring overall conversion rates.
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
Using Google analytics I investigated the drop off percentages through each step in the user journey. I would later set up heat and click mapping on our payment step. This allowed me to measure the attention our users were giving to particular areas on the website.
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
I set up collaborative mapping sessions with the team and stakeholders. We kept it rough and low-fi. This would develop our collective understanding of the user, and later allow us to actively develop fresh ideas through wireframing.
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
I brought the ideas we discussed as a team to life. This created a better round of refinements and allowed me to set a test plan for optimisation trials (A/B testing) on VWO, whilst the project was progressing. By doing this I received live quantitative results, based on our ideas.
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Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
The average time spent on this page was significantly more than any other within the journey. The logic for the user interaction was really clunky. My aim for this trial was simply to reduce user interaction by loading the correct keyboard when prompted, pre-populating as much information as possible.
+
16%
Uplift compared to baseline metric
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
+
50%
Reduction in overall page interaction time
I specifically worked on reducing the amount of user interaction and thought when they reach any payment step in a journey. This new logic, guides the user through from field to field without the need to select the correct keypad or click away. We do the thinking and validation for the users. Once again this was one of many tests run during this project.
Prototyping
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
I constantly created wireframes throughout the project process in multiple fidelities. I would then test high-fi prototypes with both our stakeholders and users before proceeding to the build phase. I found it to be a more cost and time effective way of getting a project live.
Smartlabs Smart Coin Design lead, UX and UI
Our team motto for this project was in homage to Steve Krug’s
book, ‘Don’t make me think’. The payment service now pre-populates as much information about our customer as possible. We dramatically reduced the amount of user interaction. The service now guides them through from one required field to the next.
Positively changing a payment and checkout process
73% Completed payment % across all products
+
25%
Uplift compared to baseline metric
+
15%
Overall journey conversion uplift
Amigo Loans This next section aims to give you a brief overview of some of the work I did at Amigo Loans. I worked as both the Digital and UX designer within the product and marketing teams. This Agile environment allowed me to move between different teams, working closely alongside the CEO and Managing Director. My time here allowed me to test and optimise our products on a very large scale. I frequently conducted A/B and multivariate testing on all digital platforms. I also conducted user testing sessions, gathered user research and led multi-million-pound projects from end to end. Having full exposure to the digital and direct channels, as well as the internal systems, I have had the opportunity to get under the skin of a multi-million pound company. This has allowed me to utilise UX, CRO and Design best practice, aligning user and customer feedback in order to get the best results. Here is a small sample of that work. Please get in touch if you’d like to hear more about my processes.
Not like the high street banks
Amigo Loans Corporate Website Design lead and UI
I was tasked with rethinking Amigo’s corporate website to make it a smoother, upfront and easier to understand. As The Design lead on this project, I brought flat UI and multichannel accessibility to all devices and services, to support business integration strategies.
Amigo Loans Conversion Rate Optimisation UX Research, CRO
+38%
+35%
Increase in apply page visits from all internal website pages
Increase in CTR from homepage to apply page.
I ran multiple A/B and multivariate tests. I ran this test specifically for the website CTA and navigation. We isolated 20% of total website traffic in order to run any testing through before rolling changes out to 100% of our users. This test increased CTRs from the homepage to the apply journey, and has increased the overall journey conversion.
58%
91%
57%
Increase in guarantor signatures vs control on mobile and desktop.
Increase in average loan size vs control on mobile and desktop.
Increase in click to conversion rate vs control on mobile and desktop.
Amigo Loans PPC Landing Pages Digital Design, UX + CRO
I ran multivariate tests on landing pages, specifically for our PPC traffic. Providing the user with personalised content, relating to their search term is important for conversion at this time. This would later become a very important test bed for overall website progression. Knowing and understanding what works, leads to better-informed design decisions based on real evidence.
It’s good to have an Amigo
Amigo Loans Integrated Email Campaigns Design Lead, UX + CRO
I designed and managed Amigo’s integrated email campaigns across all business channels to create an efficient journey for users. Whether it be prospecting new business or customer retention, email marketing is an important part of the overall message to customers. I was responsible for the UX investigation, validation, testing (A/B and multivariate), leading the design and creative approach.
Thank you for viewing my portfolio. If you need further information about any project or process, please do not hesitate to get in contact with me.