PayLink is the future of e-wallets with cards, bank accounts, and crypto all in one secure place on any device. With PayLink, sending and receiving money has never been easier.
User Personas
I created three user personas in order to better understand the type of people who may be using PayLink on a day-to-day basis.
My first user, Ronnie Alvarez, is a 29-year-old professional who would use the desktop application to create money transfers with her bank accounts. I identified some key user pain points that might impact her experience (more on that later).
My second user, Karim Malik, is a 36-year-old stay-at-home dad who needs an efficient way to keep his expenses in one place. With his children as a priority, Karim’s user pain points related mostly to efficiency and information storage.
My third and final user, Sicily Myer-Jones, is an 18-year-old college student with their own online art business. With this in mind, I identified ways PayLink may be used as a business finance tool for completing client transactions.
With each of these users engaging with the product across different devices, I knew I wanted to make several convenient integrations, shortcuts, etc. that would make paying, requesting, and storing important information as easy as possible.
From here, it was on to user journey mapping.
User Journey Mapping
With my three user personas created, I wanted to create user journey maps to understand their experiences on their devices.
For Ronnie Alvarez, her user journey would be on the desktop version of PayLink. By taking her through the process of sending money with the desktop website, I was able to further identify a few user pain points that could be improved in my design, namely, having a “recent users/transactions” capability for repeated transaction.
Karim Malik was my mobile (iOS) user who went through the process of requesting money from another user. It became continually apparent to me that the storage of information and “frequently contacted users” might be a helpful addition in my final design.
For Sicily Myer-Jones, they reviewed business transactions on their iPad. For this user, I identified some important user pain points regarding customer support and business transactions. Easily switching between personal and business accounts is a must.
With all of these journeys mapped and my understanding of my potential users better than it was before, it was time to begin my paper wireframing…
Paper Wireframes
Paper wireframing is one of my favorite parts of the design process. I use the common UX exercise called “Crazy Eights” to rapidly iterate designs with few constraints. I decided I wanted to start with the mobile application and work my way to desktop (as opposed to the other way around).
This exercise helps me identify features that re-appear in my designs which may be worth making note of. While Crazy Eights may result in a final design, part of why this exercise is so great is the designs are low commitment. They simply act as a jumping off point for my low-fidelity wireframes, which are up next.
Low-fidelity Digital Wireframes and Prototype
With my paper wireframes complete, it was time to launch Figma. I created low-fidelity digital wireframes for an iPhone, iPad, Macbook, and desktop browser.
I then mapped the wireframes into a prototype for early usability testing to see what might be confusing for users. Doing so helped me identify user pain points regarding money transfers to bank accounts and requesting money.
With these findings, I was able to adjust my low-fidelity designs before moving on. This saved me valuable time (and in a business situation, it would save valuable money).
With my findings and my lo-fi wireframes in good shape, I was able to move on to high-fidelity digital wireframing and prototyping.
High-fidelity Digital Wireframes and Prototype
After experimenting with a few different color schemes, I decided to go with an orange, dark gray, and white palette that was high contrast and would meet WCAG standards.
PayLink came to life as an easy-to-understand but still aesthetically pleasing website and application that allows users to send, receive, and transfer money to and from their bank accounts, buy and sell crypto currency, and securely store their credit/debit card information.
With the ever-growing industry of FinTech at the forefront of the world, I wanted to try my hand at designing a product that I could imagine people using on a day-to-day.
