Now App - Product Rethinking (UX/UI/UCD)

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Now is a reimagining of MULTICAIXA Express (MCX Express) by EMIS, Angola's leading wallet and interbanking payment solution, with strategic focus to make everything absolute easy as possible, throughout the entire value chain. During the last couple of years, MCX Express has never been more relevant, especially because of the recent global shift. MCX Express is used by almost everyone between 18-34 years old with a smartphone, it's that relevant. My design concept is based on two of EMIS' purposes: Customer focus and Quality. Furthermore, the concept builds on EMIS' values and empowers its main audience while also providing extraordinary customer experience.

THE PROBLEM

Due to being an interbanking payment solution based on local banks, MCX Express only works locally and doesn't integrate with international payment networks like VISA or Mastercard, which lead to lost opportunities. This problem causes the target audience to be more likely to adopt other solutions for alternative payments and online payments, leading to lower in-app transactions. This is also an issue for app users, as wiring money internationally or applying for a digital payment enabled card (e.g.: VISA, Mastercard, etc.) can be costly and time-consuming.

THE CHALLENGE

My goal for this project was to create a more seamless experience that is more in line with current financial solutions while still retaining what makes MCX Express great, its ease of use and practicality. The main premise is simple: with a few taps, make a payment. However, I did not wish to simply revert to the past.

My ambitions were to create a strong foundation that embraced a rapidly evolving business and a more diverse user base.

My high-level goals were to:

1. Make it fast and easy to use for everyone, everywhere.

2. Increase interest in local payment solutions

3. Give users more control of their finances and freedom on payments.

4. Create a platform for innovation and deeper engagement.

MY ROLE

I led the design of this project from end-to-end from November 2021 to February 2022 and collaborated with a Designer and Programmer during the discovery.

In addition, I also did the Research, Content Strategy, Interaction, and Visual Design roles in this project.

THE DISCOVERY

PICKING UP THE PIECES

At the outset of the project, I didn't have a clear mission or specific goals for the payment experience. Without pre-existing insights, I decided to explore how users interacted with financial solutions through research.

TARGET AUDIENCE

UNDERSTANDING THE USER

To better understand the users' behavior, I surveyed 92 people on payment and financial solutions and how they used them. From that sample, only 69 participants answered that they used solutions of this type, meaning current marketing strategies fail to reach 25% of people in that segment.

UNDERSTANDING THE MARKET

In Angola, MCX Express is the biggest and best payment solution currently, there are little to none who can oppose it. But what about external threats? Research showed that MCX Express wasn't as good as international solutions in the same segment.

I had to understand what made them so attractive to MCX Express users, the method I used to achieve that goal was doing a competitive analysis of user favorite apps.

DEFINING THE USER

Based on insights and data, I created a persona that represents MCX Express' main user base.

GETTING INTO THE HEAD OF THE USER

Before I could jump into designing, it was important to understand the users and the payment experience at scale.

To that effect, some questions needed to be answered:

1. WHO are we emphasizing with?

2. What do they need to DO?

3. What do they SEE?

4. What do they SAY?

5. What do they DO?

6. What do they HEAR?

All answers to the above questions impact user behavior in some way or another.

THE USER JOURNEY

WHAT VALUE DOES THIS PRODUCT BRING TO USERS?

MCX Express is all about carrying the ATM in your pocket and therefore is an extension of the experience of using an ATM. Its interface, navigation, and features are mostly inherited from EMIS' ATM experience. Now, on the other hand, had to be designed based on what is familiar to the users and add what was missing to the current experience of MCX Express.

Therefore, my biggest question was:

"...how might we add value to the current experience?"

By this point, I had begun to diverge from the premise of a simple redesign and getting closer to a new product, and thus Now was born.

REDESIGNING THE ARCHITECTURE

Now was built based on MCX Express and as such, all the things that made it bad had to be addressed. I began with the architecture, I needed to understand how information was organized on MCX Express.

"...how might we improve the information architecture?"

MCX Express' Sitemap

Now's Sitemap

THE USER FLOW

DESIGN

WIREFRAMES

IMPROVED AUTHENTICATION

Now, improves the previous reliance on ATMs in favor of a completely digital signup.

VIRTUAL CARDS WHEN NEEDED, ANYWHERE

Now is backward compatible and supports both widely used cards like VISA and Master card but also Multicaixa Cards. But due to inherent safety issues, Multicaixa cards can only be added via ATM, like with MCX Express.

Virtual cards can be added for both national and international networks via the app.