Redefine the
way users feel
about budgeting.
PLUM APP DESIGN
Role
Product Designer
Team
Personal Project
Timeline
Jan-Feb 2024
Tools
Figma, InVision
Imagine this…
After a hectic work week, you’re finally out at dinner with your friends that you have all been anticipating. However, amidst the cheerful ambiance, a sense of unease starts lingering in the background as you recall your tight budget constraints for the month. Your friends cheerfully order their favorites, and as you look down the menu, each enticing dish seems to mock your financial concerns. The once-anticipated dinner outing now feels like a source of stress and anxiety, dampening the joyful moment.
Background
As young adults navigate the transition from adolescence to independence, they often face new financial responsibilities, such as rent, bills, student loans, and other living expenses, while also managing limited income sources. For many, this experience is a challenging and stressful time to go through.
Changing the way people view budgeting from restrictive into a beneficial tool that gives them the freedom to spend may help mitigate the stress from financial anxiety. I wanted to improve the confidence in people’s ability to quickly recover from financial set-backs caused by the decisions they make.
Why can budgeting be so difficult?
USER RESEARCH
I interviewed young adults of diverse lifestyles and that work full time jobs to uncover specific behavior when it came to managing their own finances. Insights revealed that each individual aspired to obtain some sort of financial stability, but struggled to stay motivated when challenged with their own unique financial situations.
People deal with irregular incomes along with spontaneous expenses, which makes it difficult to stay on top of repaying debt and leads to financial uncertainty.
Consistency
People fail to track their expenses because it can feel tedious. However, it’s also frustrating to have to wait for problems to unfold in order to do something about them.
Awareness
People feel intimidated with the complexity of money management because they lacked proper financial education and feel overwhelmed from the abundance of resources.
Financial Literacy
We are not alone…
SECONDARY RESEARCH
To get a better understanding of what my interviewees were feeling, I wanted to look at some numbers to identify how significant their challenges were. Based on a survey (Manulife, 2019) to see how people managed their money, results showed that people felt the stress from financial strain caused by poor spending habits and decision making, along with facing uncontrollable financial factors.
2/10
Canadians expressed confidence in their financial situations.
38%
of Canadians admit to living beyond their means
27%
of young people did not have access to financial education in school.
There was an opportunity to directly address the psychological factor of managing money. To reframe my gathered insights for a potential solution, I came up with the following statement...
How might we support young adults to overcome the stress of making financial decisions, while dealing with budget constraints?
Meet Camila!
USER PERSONA
Since I am trying to address a problem rooted with emotion, I wanted to create a persona so that I can gain a clearer visualization of user expectations, and make more informed design decisions accordingly.
What did the experts say?
PRODUCT PRINCIPLES
To help guide my decisions towards an ideal product experience, I went back to my secondary research for recommended solutions on how to improve an individual’s capability to deal with financial hardships.
Current apps are falling short.
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS
Recognizing that there are existing financial management apps to support users with their budgeting, I structured a competitive analysis based on features that would be considered essential and/or unique. I then conducted the analysis by going through existing reviews, being in conversation with current users, and gathering feedback from testing.
There are many financial management apps available that offers unique approaches to budgeting. However, it is unfortunate that missing key features within each app is what could be preventing users from overcoming the stress when dealing with budget constraints.
What can plum offer?
VALUE PROPOSITION
I wanted to create an experience where users don’t feel overwhelmed when their decision does not align with their original plans. It is a more realistic mentality, and there’s always a way to get back on track!
A seamless design, that combines the missing key features from some existing financial management apps, can offer a solution that supports users with accountability, proactiveness, and simplification (our design principles).
Designing a less stressful experience!
DESIGN SCOPE
The design I created was structured within a budgeting app, and the features/functions I focused on were Automatic Categorized Transactions and the Reallocation of Funds.
Automatic Categorized Transactions can simplify budget tracking in a more efficient and time-saving manner. This feature also ensures consistency, because users can easily hold themselves accountable to their decision-making with a clear and more accurate view of their spending patterns.
The Reallocation of Funds feature can help alleviate the stress from being too conservative with spending. If unexpected expenses arise, transferring funds between budget categories is a proactive approach to ensure that the user can stay within their overall budget constraints.
To help maintain my vision, I constructed a user flow diagram, that included the user to perform tasks by engaging with the features I wanted to focus on. By having the user start off with overspending within their budget, but then end off with a balanced budget by a straightforward process, it will leave the user with a sense of accomplishment from making a financial decision through unexpected adversity.
How can I make budgeting look simple?
DESIGN ITERATION
Keeping my design principles and the design scope in mind, the next phase focused on exploring various designs to creating an effective budgeting system product experience.
Design Iterations - Overall Budget Screen
Design Iterations - Reallocation of Funds Screen
When designing for a budgeting app, I needed to decide how to structure the budgeting system. I chose to follow a zero-based budgeting method as it allowed for greater flexibility in allocating funds across various categories. This method also allowed me to provide a clear hierarchy for organizing budget categories as either Needs, Wants, or Savings. The design focus here is to maintain usability.
Furthermore, the complexities of budgeting made the design process more challenging. Based on the feedback I gained from user testing between design iterations, users had a difficult time navigating through an abundance of information all at once, while trying to understand how the budgeting system works. From this, my goal was to maximize visualizing information in order to improve user engagement with a clear and intuitive user interface.
A new way to budget!
FINAL PRODUCT
Split your income into Needs, Wants, and Savings. This ensures to cover your essential needs first, followed by discretionary spending and saving for the future.
Prioritize your spending
Swipe through your budget categories as a faster way to get a better snapshot on how your spending habits align with your financial goals.
Gain better control of your budget
Your transactions will automatically be tracked and categorized, so that you focus more time and energy on other aspects of managing your finances.
Budgeting made efficient
When you overspend on a budget category, simply reallocate your funds to maintain overall budget balance. This feature will equip you with flexibility against inconsistent cash flow.
Think “bigger picture”
Don’t worry about making the wrong decision. You can preview results and other necessary information you need before taking action.
Be confident with your decisions
plum - Experience it yourself!
FINAL PROTOTYPE
Money -
it’s complicated
CONSTRAINTS & RESULTS
Money is such a loaded topic, which made it difficult to design limited features to make sense and functional, without the structure of an entire financial management app. This constraint made me focus on users to give me feedback based on a more conceptual perspective rather than a logical perspective.
Impressed Users
After having my user interviewees review the final product, they believed that its functionality would increase their confidence to deal with financial decisions, and that plum would motivate them to live with a budget.
Learning Curve
Users needed more initial support to understand how to use the final product. However, most of them got the hang of it quickly.
Sense of personal accomplishment!
REFLECTION
More than just learnings as a designer
This project challenged my own financial literacy. On top of practicing my end-to-end design skills, I developed relevant skills, knowledge, and behavior needed to make informed financial decisions.
Storytelling
I’d like to improve my storytelling skills to enhance engagement and retention between my work and my audience. I also want to develop my decision making when it comes to choosing the appropriate design methods.
plum - moving forward
- Effective onboarding would support essential learning curve
- Developing UI to be “playful” to speak to younger audience
