Pockets

In today's rapidly evolving global economy, the importance of prudent financial management cannot be overstated. Mexico and the United States are two countries whose populations are financially intertwined. In both nations, with their diverse economic landscapes and significant income disparities, the ability to effectively save and manage money is not just a convenience but a necessity for financial security.

In Mexico, where remittances play a vital role in the economy and a large portion of the population remains unbanked, and in the United States, where consumer debt is a growing concern and retirement savings are often inadequate, there is a very evident need for some type of tool that can bring families financial health and stability.

Role

Product Design, UX/UI Design, UX Research

Tools

Figma, Miro

JUMP TO PROTOTYPE

The issue identified

A pressing financial issue identified in both Mexico and the United States is the lack of widespread and easy-to-use tools for effective personal financial management. Americans lose an average of $1,819 USD annually due to financial illiteracy, and 77% of Americans report being financially anxious and struggle with budgeting due to a culture of consumerism. Experts say almost 40% of mexicans have a low level of financial knowledge.

Peole seem to think that tracking expenses and saving money is very complicated due to lack of knowledge on the matter and lack of time and willingness to learn.

The solution

To provide Mexicans and Americans a tool to create an environment for their earning and spending in which they will not struggle to pay their recurrent bills, set realistic financial goals, understand their spending habits, and save money.

Research

The goal was to understand what was behind the issues people face regarding money: everything related to earning it, keeping it, managing it, spending it, even owing it; finding the specific step in this process where we could step in and create a tool that would take away the struggle of having to use their willpower to keep themselves from spending money they know they have to (or want to) use for other things.

During the research phase, we conducted surveys and interviews to Mexicans and Americans ages 18 - 62 that were currently employed or were the main managers of finances in their homes to understand more about their process and their biggest pains around managing money.

We documented all the methods people use to save and separate their money, to make recurrent payments, to buy products and services, etc.

Insights

The topic with the hightest number of comments was 'lack of willpower'.
There were specifically 2 comments that were most repeated:

1. "I have to exercise my willpower to decide not to spend money when I know I have to spend it elsewhere."

2. "When I see all my money in my account, I assume I have a lot and I can spend some of it, but really it's already tied up in debts and bills, but all together like that, it's not clear to me, so it feels easy to spend more than I should."

The most important thing we gathered from our surveys and interviews, that we understood we would have to solve for users was:

Eliminating the need to use their willpower to stop themselves from buying things.
Users get to the moment they want to buy something, and sometimes end up caving and buying it even if they know they should not be spending that money. Willpower is a hard thing to keep up for a long time. Instead, we had to make it so that they wouldn't get to the situation that needs them to exercise their willpower to stop themselves from spending money in the first place.
Removing the illusion that they have a lot of money to spend if most of that money is already destined for bills and debts.
- We had to find a way for users not to be fooled by the amount of money they saw in their account, since a lot of that money is not really available to be spent, but seeing it all in the account created a false sense of security.

Narrowing down

After all the information we obtained from the surveys and interviews, we gathered the most important things the design should or should not contain.

We decided that our design had to include a way to keep users from seeing the complete amount of money they had in their account, and only show the money they were able to spend that month. We also decided to include a way to separate the money not shown so that it they would keep the money separated for particular uses.

We understood the app had to look similar to other financial and banking apps that the users have interacted with before, to reduce friction, and it had to show the users' accounts, credit cards, and previous transactions.

We also found out that giving users a way to create reminders to save money would not only increase the likelihood that users would end up putting money away at specific times, but also that it would remind them about savings and being financially responsible. The reminders would also help users designate specific times of the month for putting the money away (for example, one person being paid on the 1st of every month might want to put away money for rent that same day, so that they no longer see it in their account are not tempted to spend it on something else).

AI moodboard

As an experiment, we used AI-generated images to create a moodboard for finance-related apps that used the color pallete that had been chosen for this project, to test the colors and make adjustments. We got some pretty interesting results, although they were all very loaded and we were aiming for a clean, light look.

Ideas and sketches

During sketch time, we identified the general look of the app. We wanted to make it look similar to banking apps that would give users a sense of familiarity, and divide elements into blocks for easy navigation. We identified the elements we wanted the design to contain and experimented with different placement.

These were the winners.

Meet our users

Using the Jobs to be Done framework, we identified our target user. The job to be done here was to manage money effectively so that the person would have the enough to pay their bills and also be able to save money for a vacation, emergencies, etc., and start getting rid of already existing debt, while not accumulating more.

A person in their mid 30's that lives paycheck to paycheck, is struggling with debt, and does not have the willpower, means or knowledge to get out of that situation. This age group already has responsibilities, lives by themselves, are tech savyy, and can benefit from a tool that keeps them financially responsible without having to invest too much effort into it.

Wireframing

Having established the general look of the app and the elements it would contain, we created a visual guide to represent the skeletal framework. This was the final placement of all the components in the main screens.

Style guide

We decided on the color scheme, fonts, and style of the most used components to establish a set of rules for keeping visual coherence.

Purple is associated with luxury, wealth, ambition, etc., but also, with creativity, wisdom, pride, and independence.

Orange was chosen as the accent color for attention and contrast since it is the complementary color of our primary one.

The End Product

The final product is an app that lets users put money away for specific needs as soon as the receive it. This way, next time they buy anything, they know exactly how much of the money in their account is actually available to spend, reducing the need to use willpower to stop themselves from spending already tied up money, and removing the "I see a lot of money in my account so I assume it's okay to spend some" effect.

Reminders help users make this process a part of their financial habits.

Final prototype

User flow

See accounts and credit cards

See account details

Manage existing pockets

Create new pocket

Deposit or withdraw money from pockets