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About
Esure are a major UK insurance company and were looking to improve their car insurance offering by entering the multicar market. Multicar allows drivers to insure multiple cars and drivers under one policy and to receive discounts and benefits by doing so. This was one of two projects I ran simultaneously, it looked to explore the long term possibilities of how multicar could work if there were no constraints to consider. The other project was the delivery of a minimum viable product (MVP) that would go live to customers.
The Goal
Explore how esure’s multicar offering could work in an ideal situation. To build and user test a responsive prototype that enabled customers to easily grasp the concept and take out a multicar policy. It also needed to inform and guide the development of the other multicar MVP project.
1) Kick off workshop
To start the project I ran a kick off workshop with the key stakeholders. The aim of the workshop was to set out goals and expectations for the project and to gain as much insight and knowledge as possible. During the session we walked through user journeys, outlined key customers, wrote user stories and completed a project canvas. These would then all filter in and inform more detailed work later in the project.
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2) Competitor analysis
Understanding how competitors positioned themselves and the journeys they were offering allowed the team to evaluate where the market was at the moment and what areas were open to improvement. I conducted a heuristic evaluation and a step by step walkthrough of the main competitor offerings which was then fed back and discussed with stakeholders and the team to inform next steps.
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3) Personas
Esure have traditionally only insured ‘safe drivers’ but through this project they wanted to look at how they might make their offering available to a wider range of potential customers. In order to build empathy and allow decisions to be made from a user’s perspective I created personas that represented their current audience and the new customers that they were looking to appeal to.
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4) User journeys
In order to understand the possibilities of what we could achieve I first wanted to look at how things currently worked. I mapped out the current single car journey breaking down each question and step in the process. With this knowledge I then looked at how it related to the multicar journey and how information could be re-organised to aid understanding and flow for the user.
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5) Call centre
I visited the Glasgow call centre to listen to calls and speak with call handlers, they were the ones dealing with customers on a daily basis so would hold invaluable knowledge. The aim was to understand the most frequent questions customers asked and the language used when talking about car insurance. I could then take this information and work it into the journey to ensure key points and concerns were addressed up front in a language that made sense to the user.
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6) Sketches
Taking the information I had gathered up to this point I started to sketch out ideas and concepts on paper and whiteboards. Involving others in the team to get different points of view and knowledge. As this was a blue sky thinking exercise I looked to other disciplines like computer game design and level editors for inspiration. Selected ideas were then refined further and working closely with the UI designer were given more narrative and structure.
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7) Wireframes
With a range of ideas floating about I started to build these into wireframes. Looking to better incorporate the user journeys into the process and to make sure that there was a flow to the process. These wireframes were then shared and discussed with stakeholders and the team to see whether they were heading in the right direction and were achieving what we had set out in the initial kick off workshop.
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8) Prototype
Using Axure I developed the wireframes further to build interactive prototypes of varying fidelity. Ideas were still being tested and evolving but were beginning to solidify. The prototypes were used to guide discussions with developers and UI designers about how the final high fidelity prototype would look and work.
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9) Build
Certain interactions and relationships would only work in a coded prototype. Working closely with the developer throughout the project we discussed the details of the wireframes and prototypes and the intended outcomes. These conversations informed decisions about how the code was structured, how certain interactions would work and ensured what was being imagined could be built in the time available.
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10) Test
Finally I ran a user testing session with 5 participants to help us understand whether the new approach to taking out car insurance was feasible and usable. Esure were invited to watch the sessions and feedback on the findings. The sessions were then written up and a final round of amends were made to the prototype before the project was presented back to the stakeholders.
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Outcomes
I presented the outcomes and findings from the project back to the wider esure team. The user feedback was positive and has highlighted a more feasible way of organising information when dealing with insurance. Key stakeholders are talking about using the concepts and designs across the entire esure online portal.
This project has been invaluable in directing and aiding the understanding on the delivery of the MVP multicar project. Removing and addressing many major hurdles and enabling the team to foresee and address issues before they derail coming sprints.