Project 01 | Design | Equilibrium

Xero software

Founded in 2006, Xero now has 3 million subscribers and is a leader in cloud accounting across New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom. Xero’s online accounting software connects small business owners with their numbers, their bank, and advisors anytime.

Problem Statement

A stay at home mum who has decided to start her own
hand-made jewellery business, feels overwhelmed by the financial aspects of starting a small business. She wants to be in control and knowledgable of her businesses financial position, but has no experience in accounting.

My Role
UX Researcher, Prototyping, UI Design

Project Goals

Understand the role the homepage plays in
helping users locate important information
Understand the role the homepage plays in
driving conversion.
Look for opportunities to improve the experience
and any pain points

Approach

A background research was the first priority. To understand how the business worked and the features they provided their customers gave us a better idea of what needed to be highlighted and displayed on the homepage.

A competitor analysis was conducted to compare how competitors navigated users to their services and drive customers to convert to their accounting systems.

We recruited many small business owners and accountants to test the current homepage to find pain points and "hidden gems" of insight.

A website audit and heuristic evaluation was also carried out on the homepage.

Findings

From synthesising all the data we came down to some core customer needs:

Navigation
Xero has many services and features that helps all types of businesses. Customers found it frustrating and difficult to find the right type of service and features they needed for their business.

Price Price Price
Customers wanted to see very early on the plans and pricing Xero offered.

Support and Help
New business owners found it intimidating as there was no online support to help them.

Human Touch
A lack of reviews and human interaction in the product imagery made customers not trust the product as much.

Ideation and Prototyping

From understanding the core customer needs I was able to ideate prototypes with the use of Crazy 8s and card sorting.

Final hi-fidelity prototypes
Hi-fidelity prototypes were created in Figma and were user tested by numerous customers, which in turn ended with us creating a second iteration of the homepage. Below is the final iteration of the prototype.

Mobile

Learnings

Research is the key to designing a good website and app. User testing from numerous accountants and new business owners gave us the right insights to design a homepage catered to their needs which in turn drives conversion.

Xero software

Problem Statement A stay at home mum who has decided to start her own hand-made jewellery business, feels overwhelmed by the financial aspects of starting a small business. She wants to be in control and knowledgable of her businesses financial position, but has no experience in accounting.

My Role UX Researcher, Prototyping, UI Design

Project Goals

​

Understand the role the homepage plays in helping users locate important information

Understand the role the homepage plays in driving conversion.

Look for opportunities to improve the experience and any pain points

Ideation and Prototyping From understanding the core customer needs I was able to ideate prototypes with the use of Crazy 8s and card sorting.

Final hi-fidelity prototypes Hi-fidelity prototypes were created in Figma and were user tested by numerous customers, which in turn ended with us creating a second iteration of the homepage. Below is the final iteration of the prototype.

Mobile

Learnings Research is the key to designing a good website and app. User testing from numerous accountants and new business owners gave us the right insights to design a homepage catered to their needs which in turn drives conversion.

Desktop

Problem Statement

A stay at home mum who has decided to start her own
hand-made jewellery business, feels overwhelmed by the financial aspects of starting a small business. She wants to be in control and knowledgable of her businesses financial position, but has no experience in accounting.

My Role
UX Researcher, Prototyping, UI Design

Understand the role the homepage plays in
helping users locate important information

Understand the role the homepage plays in
driving conversion.

Look for opportunities to improve the experience
and any pain points

Ideation and Prototyping

From understanding the core customer needs I was able to ideate prototypes with the use of Crazy 8s and card sorting.

Final hi-fidelity prototypes
Hi-fidelity prototypes were created in Figma and were user tested by numerous customers, which in turn ended with us creating a second iteration of the homepage. Below is the final iteration of the prototype.

Learnings

Research is the key to designing a good website and app. User testing from numerous accountants and new business owners gave us the right insights to design a homepage catered to their needs which in turn drives conversion.