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CFTPay Mobile
UX, visual design, product conception and planning. Launched in 2019 for Finxera Inc.
Introducing mobile apps to an industry
Finxera (under the sub-brand CFTPay) is a multi-channel payment processor and software provider to the debt relief industry. Think of us as a digital wallet that you get signed up for automatically when you enroll in debt relief. We created the CFTPay mobile app for our enterprise customers to provide in turn to their end users.
In addition to providing information about account balances and transactions, the CFTPay app leverages the mobile push notification channel to reduce turnaround times on urgent e-sign requests, and allows clients to use their device cameras to upload important documents in a timely manner.
Finxera's B2B customers love the app, and it has seen rapid adoption, especially among the industry's growing 40-and-under demographic.
My role
I did the full visual and UX design of the app from scratch, including the creation of a revised color palette. I served as a product manager for the app from its inception until years after its launch, piloting and shipping features in collaboration with our enterprise customers.
Prior to that, I created interactive prototypes used by our business development team to gather customer feedback until development began.
Tools I used
I designed the app from scratch in Sketch, and published it in Zeplin to our in-house developers.
Visual design
I created a fresh perspective on CFTPay's brand identity and design patterns for our new foray into mobile.
Components:
The brand's color palette is modernized and expanded from what existed on our web properties.
The app has a modern aesthetic that steers away from the looks of traditional banking apps.
The design is unified across iOS and Android
A full custom set of icons meets the app's unique needs.
Color and typography
I created a modernized version of the brand's color palette for the app, and we selected Proxima Nova as our new typographic identity for all new products.
Incorporating another brand into the app
Solving a tricky problem around co-branding
The CFTPay app is created by CFTPay for consumers whose direct relationship is with their debt settlement company rather than CFTPay. Think of it as a digital wallet that you are automatically signed up for when you join a debt relief program. The app is advertised to clients by their debt relief companies after program enrollment.
This created a question around how the app would be branded and marketed. We agreed that in the long run, we might consider having multiple white labeled copies of the app, each under the brand name and visual identity of our debt relief partners.
In the short term, we would launch just one app under the brand CFTPay, and it would display brand elements of the debt settlement company.
Given this constraint, my solution to the co-branding problem was to give our customers a card on the home page of the app that contained their logo and customizable text.
Life-changing news!
Driving engagement through push notifications
Push notifications is a marquee feature of the app. It has challenged the industry to think of ways to increase the success of their clients through increasing engagement.
We targeted the following problems using push notifications:
Getting e-signatures
Debt relief negotiators settle debts for clients, but they need clients to authorize settlements quickly so that they can come into effect. Push notifications are now a major source of accepted settlements among users of the app.
Training users to expect monthly debits.
There were efforts in the industry to prevent clients from "NSFing", or not having enough money in their checking account to fund monthly deposits into escrow to repay their debts. We are establishing automatic push notifications to clients well in advance of each deposit to train clients to ensure that they will be able to clear them, and letting them know when deposits fail. This project is underway, and we hope to have data on its effectiveness soon.
Looking back, looking forward
The app has set Finxera apart as an innovator in the highly competitive debt relief payment processor space, and some of our customers have shown through eager adoption that they love it.
In the long run, I would like to make the app part of a broader project of helping out customers with their mobile strategy, including discussions around SMS campaigns, web portals, and feature innovations that will push the debt settlement customer experience into the self-service mobile future.