At the beginning of 2021, I was hired as the 12th employee at Juni to establish a high-performing product design team. I joined shortly after the founders had secured seed funding. At that time, there was no product—only a company vision, a prototype, and a waiting list of early customers expressing interest. My mission was to create a team that would integrate customer insights and develop outstanding features. Over the next three and a half years, I undertook the below initiatives:
Overview
Market positioning
Product audit and feedback synthesis
Strategic scenarios
Before & after comparison
5 key takeaways
Market positioning
The brand is currently about sustainability and is operatiing in the finance space. Their target audience is… Demographics: Age, gender, income, education, etc. Psychographics: Lifestyle, values, interests, and behaviors. Positioning Strategy:
Positioning Statement: A clear statement that defines how the company wishes to be perceived in the market.
Value Proposition: The value delivered to customers, distinct from competitors.
Current features
Product or Service Analysis: Unique Selling Proposition (USP): What makes the company's offerings unique compared to competitors.
Product Quality and Range: The breadth and quality of products or services.
Pricing Strategy: How pricing reflects the brand’s market positioning.
Market conditions
Competitive Landscape: Major competitors, their market share, strengths, and weaknesses. Market Size and Growth: The overall size and growth trajectory of the market in which the company operates. Industry Trends: Emerging trends that may influence the market.
Beta product
Direct Comparison: How the brand compares directly to key competitors on aspects like price, quality, and market presence.
Niche Market Strategies: Specific strategies aimed at dominating a smaller segment of a broader market.
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With the product live and user feedback flowing in from the sales and customer success teams, we continued to iterate and enhance the feature set. One of our initial focuses was refining the onboarding process to streamline new customer integration. We quickly recognized that offering virtual cards as an early benefit was essential. Card exchanges became one of our first revenue streams, highlighting the importance of making it easy for customers to sign up and access these services.
Product audit and feedback synthesis
SWOT Analysis:
Strengths: Internal capabilities and resources that give the company an advantage.
Weaknesses: Areas where the company may be at a disadvantage.
Opportunities: External factors that the company could exploit to its advantage.
Threats: External challenges that could pose problems for the company.
Customer feedback
User journey mapping allowed all stakeholders to take a step back from their specific responsibilities and see their contributions as part of the entire user experience. This strategic overview helped define key areas and served as the guiding framework for our approach.
Opportunity areas
The result was a vision prototype that demonstrated potential solutions to critical scenarios outlined in the vision. In this case, we aimed to showcase a task-centric user interface that simplifies navigation and resolution of the most pressing financial issues, without the users needing to interact separately with each feature of the platform.
Strategic scenarios
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Scenario 1 - UX improvements
With multiple initiatives underway simultaneously, a robust information architecture was necessary. Building and reusing design patterns allowed us to develop and connect product features uniformly. Launching an initial version of our Design System accelerated the development process while maintaining consistency. Continuous vision prototypes enabled us to go beyond mere feature requests, assessing opportunities that align closely with our company vision.
Scenario 2 - financial hub for all my financial well being
As a result, we developed a wide array of new features to diversify our revenue streams and enhance the overall user experience. We typically began with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and iterated based on feedback. Below is a selection of the most significant products and features:
Scenario 3 - The sustainable app to spend and track all my spendings
As a result, we developed a wide array of new features to diversify our revenue streams and enhance the overall user experience. We typically began with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and iterated based on feedback. Below is a selection of the most significant products and features:
Concepts
With a rebranding happening when coming out of beta, and a generally much more complex product we wanted to use this opportunity to unify our designs that become increasingly inconsistent with an increased team size.
Cpncept A (Scenario 1)
Initially, we utilized Ant.Design for our product development. While it offered extensive functionality, we encountered areas that were either superfluous or lacking. Our approach involved consolidating and refining this design system to align with our rebranding efforts, updating existing components, and creating new ones with a keen focus on accessibility.
Cpncept B (Scenario 1)
The result of these efforts was the creation of our own Figma libraries, which bridged the Design and Frontend teams through the use of Storybook. We established initial processes for working with and contributing to the Design System, allowing for considerable autonomy within the team while ensuring coverage for all design cases. Design System work was a collective effort, but we specifically assigned one designer and one front-end developer to set up and maintain the system. We also implemented a preliminary evaluation phase to monitor the progress and adoption of the Design System.
Cpncept C (Scenario 3)
The result of these efforts was the creation of our own Figma libraries, which bridged the Design and Frontend teams through the use of Storybook. We established initial processes for working with and contributing to the Design System, allowing for considerable autonomy within the team while ensuring coverage for all design cases. Design System work was a collective effort, but we specifically assigned one designer and one front-end developer to set up and maintain the system. We also implemented a preliminary evaluation phase to monitor the progress and adoption of the Design System.
Key Takeaways Conclusion
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Scenario 1 - UX improvements
With multiple initiatives underway simultaneously, a robust information architecture was necessary. Building and reusing design patterns allowed us to develop and connect product features uniformly. Launching an initial version of our Design System accelerated the development process while maintaining consistency. Continuous vision prototypes enabled us to go beyond mere feature requests, assessing opportunities that align closely with our company vision.
Scenario 2 - financial hub for all my financial well being
As a result, we developed a wide array of new features to diversify our revenue streams and enhance the overall user experience. We typically began with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and iterated based on feedback. Below is a selection of the most significant products and features:
Scenario 3 - The sustainable app to spend and track all my spendings
As a result, we developed a wide array of new features to diversify our revenue streams and enhance the overall user experience. We typically began with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and iterated based on feedback. Below is a selection of the most significant products and features: