Project Brief

Invesco is a leading global asset management firm. As part of an existing Invesco US site redesign, the sites' CollegeBound 529 section needed to be reviewed and adjusted to better align with user goals and to help increase overall plan conversions.

User testing

In order to comply with company and legal regulations that restricted direct access to users, I set up two separate remote unmoderated user tests, one with ten individual investors and one with ten financial professionals.

I wrote user scripts that sought to gather: basic demographic data; testers plans for paying for college (Individual Investors); perceptions of college 529 plans in general (both roles); and whether or not they ever sold 529 plans (Financial Professionals).

Individual Investor (Parents + grandparents) Discoveries

• Most parents were not prepared to pay for college
• Several testers expressed guilt over not having done more to save
• Few understood what 529 plans were

Financial Professional Discoveries

• Very few testers had ever opened a 529 plan on behalf of their clients
• Most of the testers clients rarely asked about 529 plans
• Few had ever heard of Invesco before

"I am not a paper pusher, this isn't my responsibility." A direct quote from one of the financial professionals in regards to opening 529 plans for their clients.

Insights for improvements to the CollegeBound 529 site

• The studies showed that the content on the site for both roles was too wordy and didn't cover the main concerns of either group in an effective way.
• Individual investors consistently asked how much money they should save and what the investment could grow to.
• Financial Professionals were looking for details about plan options.
• Individual Investors also wanted a clear and concise explanation of what a 529 plan actually is, without marketing fluff.

Next steps

Based on the two studies, I worked with our senior content strategist and product owner to create a simplified navigation flow for the 529 section, along with recommendations for content and feature improvements, such as:

• Remove the gateway and allow users to change their roles directly from the 529 section
• Clearly explain what a 529 plan is and what the CollegeBound 529 plan is
• Answer common questions that users have about the plan
• Show users how much their money can grow on the main page
• Simplify the information architecture to organize the content using terms that most people understood and that surfaced the most important content without digging

Updated Information Architecture

Above: I reorganized the navigation for the 529 section by reducing the top tier options and by pulling in resources and tools into the 529 section directly, rather than have them in another section of the site like they are currently. The Open a 529 link is now repeated in multiple areas to increase discoverability. Account access is also now in its own section so as to reduce confusion with site-level role access.

Wireframe of home page recommendations

Above: This wireframe sketch combined several of the recommendations that came from the research, such as simplified content and a calculator to show users how much their money could grow over time.

Proposed design based off wireframe

Above: Preliminary high-fidelity mock of the CollegeBound 529 updates for the Individual Investor role. The intro copy has been streamlined, access to accounts is front and center, and an interactive calculator is available by default. I also suggested that a means to connect to help be available from the main landing page.

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