In-Depth Interviewing to Understand Participation in Underwriting Initiative
This research delved into understanding customer participation in an underwriting initiative. I conducted in-depth interviews with the client's customers, along with unmoderated testing and moderated interviews with UserTesting contributors. Sharing actionable insights with the product and design teams ultimately led to the facilitation of an on-site ideation session that influenced design strategy.
I conducted a competitive analysis using an unmoderated test on UserTesting. This research is qualitative and evaluative in nature.
I planned and executed the UX research for this project. I presented the research insights to stakeholders and then led an ideation session at a company on-site.
I received this research request from the product manager for the team. I collaborated with the product and design managers, as well as another’s relevant team’s product manager to identify potential topics for the plan.
The company launched a new underwriting effort, and our research aimed to uncover the reasons behind some customers participating and others not, with the goal of informing a design strategy to increase the overall participation rate.
I conducted in-depth interviews with the client’s customers who were invited to participate in the initiative. The 30-minute interviews covered topics such as customers' memory of their reaction to the request to partake in the initiative, their thoughts on why they were asked to participate, and more.
Invitees who participated had high sign-up and attendance rates, while those who didn't had low rates. To boost participation among non-participating invitees, I tried various strategies like updating recruitment emails, sending reminders, and increasing compensation, but rates remained low.
Realizing I needed a different approach, I ended up conducting unmoderated tests on UserTesting, asking contributors to think like credit card users and react to the new underwriting effort page. Those who indicated non-participation were contacted for follow-up interviews. This approach allowed me to recruit more participants and collect sufficient data.
Through the interviews, I identified different customer mindsets and developed a model to help stakeholders understand the likelihood of initiative engagement.
In addition, stakeholders were provided actionable insights aimed at helping increase participation rates for each mindset.
It's important to note that the UserTesting contributors we used may not share the same level of interest in the card as genuine customers. We made stakeholders aware of this and the potential for testing bias.
Nevertheless, I'm confident that the UserTesting contributor insights reflect what we could have learned from interviews with the client’s non-participating customers. The patterns we observed among UserTesting contributors who would participate in the initiative closely aligned with those from interviews with the credit card customers who also participated. Additionally, we found a correlation between UserTesting contributors' demographic data and their participation decision, a trend also found in our client’s customer data.
After presenting the research insights, our team was motivated to take action.
I shared the insights with colleagues from various departments like Product, Customer Experience, Credit, and Engineering during an on-site session. Together with the design manager, we facilitated an ideation session using "Crazy 8’s," a fast-paced exercise for generating diverse ideas.
This session produced a variety of compelling solutions. We then had participants jot down their favorite ideas on sticky notes and placed them on a whiteboard. The design manager and I quickly organized these into an affinity diagram and wrapped up with a discussion.
We left the session with a wealth of ideas to fuel an upcoming design sprint.
This project taught me the value of adaptability. While I wanted to interview the client company's participating customers, it was simply not possible due to the time constraints. With more time, I'd have collaborated with the research team to establish a long-term strategy to improve the overall sign-up and attendance rate for research sessions. If sign-up and attendance rates were not a concern, I might have been able to recruit a sufficient number of the client’s non-participating customers, making the findings more reliable.
