Investment funds - C6 Bank

Product Design
Context
When this project began, C6 Bank was a brand-new digital bank.
We had no active users, no historical data, and no behavioral insights to guide our decisions.
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Our challenge was to design the bank’s first version of Investment Funds, balancing:
• A very short delivery deadline
• Tight development constraints
• A target audience composed of multiple, contradictory investor profiles

‍The MVP needed to serve:
• Experienced investors
• First-time investors
• People who invest based on advice from others
• Conservative and high-risk profiles
• Users who understand financial terminology and those who don’t
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This dramatically widened the scope and complexity of the project.
The Challenge
We had to design an investment experience that was:
• Simple enough for beginners
• Robust enough for experienced investors
• Viable within the MVP timeline
• Technically feasible (no complex charts or dynamic tools at first)

We also identified four major points of attention:
‍1. Financial terminology is extremely complex
‍Oversimplifying it could frustrate experts.
Not explaining enough would alienate beginners.
‍2. Investment platforms usually include a huge variety of funds
‍Comparisons needed to be simple and intuitive.
‍3. The MVP had strict limitations
‍Advanced visualizations (e.g., charts) were out of scope.
‍4. The product needed to be launched fast
‍We needed a solution that balanced ambition and pragmatism.
Since we had no internal data, we conducted a market analysis of investment platforms that catered to diverse investor profiles.
We also explored e-commerce flows as references, because, in many ways, buying an investment share functions like purchasing a product.
This helped us identify:
• Common behaviors
• Points of friction across platforms
• Differentiators for our MVP
• Opportunities to simplify the user journey
Market & Benchmark Research
Product Design
Aug 2019
We created an Wireflow document outlining:
• What must be included
• What could be excluded
• What posed riskWhat had high potential to delight
• Technical feasibility
• Dependencies and limitations
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From there, I sketched multiple structural explorations and iterated with stakeholders until we aligned on a direction.
Defining the MVP
Product Design
Aug 2019
Design Critiques & Reviews
‍We conducted structured critiques with designers and researchers to refine flows, interactions, and hierarchy.
‍UX Writing
‍A UX writer helped refine technical terms so they remained:
• Accurate for experienced investors
• Understandable for beginners
This was key given the dual-profile challenge.
Design Process
Product Design
Aug 2019
Since the product contained several flows, we structured the usability tests into four sessions, each with a specific focus:
1. Application Flow
‍Can users invest easily and transparently?
2. Redemption Flow
‍Can they redeem investments clearly and safely?
3. Tracking & Monitoring
‍Can they monitor fund performance effortlessly?
4. Transaction History
‍Can they understand settlement times and movements?

‍Recruitment Criteria
• High-income participants (aligned with the bank’s early target audience)
• Both genders
• Investors and non-investors
• Excluded participants working in media or sensitive sectors (security reasons)

‍Hypothesis Building & Prioritization
• We mapped hypotheses before testing
• Discovered new hypotheses during sessions
• Created a backlog with priority levels based on criticality and feasibility
‍This allowed us to refine only what fit into the MVP timeline.
Usability Testing
Product Design
Aug 2019
Key Findings
• Several elements were not as clear as expected for users
• Accessibility issues were validated
• Designing for two opposite user types within one experience created unavoidable friction
• Longer screens (initially considered a risk) often helped users feel more secure and guided
Outcome
Although the MVP had strong constraints, the team gained crucial learnings that influenced the next generation of C6 Bank investment products.
Our research insights helped the company:
• Redefine the approach for future investment features
• Establish a much stronger initial research culture
• Improve design processes and discovery practices
• Build a more scalable foundation for the Investment Funds platform
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