Borrower Portal Improvements (Part 1)
Discovery and Wireframes
Lendio provides financing options for small businesses (“borrower”). The borrower applies for financing using the Lendio website. The application process takes roughly 15 to 20 minutes. After completing the application, the borrower is taken to their borrower portal. A well-qualified borrower might see several possible financing product options and a message that someone will be contacting them to discuss these options.
Possible financing options
Using FullStory to watch live sessions of this experience, it was clear that the borrower was left wondering what to do next. Another issue was discovered after listening to calls between Lendio funding managers and borrowers. During the initial call, the funding manager wasn’t even referring to the financing options that were first shown to the borrower. Instead, he or she would clarify information provided in the application and tell the borrower to wait for the offers to be received. At this point the borrower has spent 15 to 20 minutes filling out an application online, probably received several text messages, emails and phone calls from the funding manager, has been on a phone call with the funding manager, and still does not have any offers to review. To say this is not an ideal experience is a bit of an understatement. I was determined to improve the borrower experience.
To do this, the borrower portal needed to be expanded to something much larger than the current portal. This required putting together a visual framework that would have space allotted for all the new features. I began by creating a rough site map and some initial sketches of different components.
Exploration notes and sketches
The next step was to create wireframes for each page. The first page of the new borrower portal would eventually show financing offers. Realizing that these offers would not be immediately available, it was important to assure the borrower that completing the application had not been a waste of time. Several components would provide this assurance. These include:
A welcome message and a brief description of the page as well as a tutorial video that would provide instruction for navigating the borrower portal.
A borrower report card that would provide a snapshot of the business and list some possible good fit options.
A message explaining that offers will be coming and a video of the process of accepting an offer and acquiring financing.
Offer page wireframe without offers
Next, I worked on the page where the borrower could review their offers. It was important to help the borrower understand the difference between each offer and which one might be the best fit. I thought it would be helpful to have a video of a funding manager explaining each offer. Additionally, each offer might have a different set of required documents. It made sense to provide a space for the borrower to add these documents here.
Offer page wireframe with an offer
Another new page would be for the borrower profile. This was an important page for cultivating an on-going relationship with each borrower. Previously, the focus had been getting new leads to complete the application rather than providing a space for an on-going relationship. Here the borrower could edit their personal/business information as circumstances changed, allowing Lendio to provide a custom experience for each borrower.
Profile page wireframe
After all the wireframes were complete it was time to put together an Invision prototype. The Invision Craft plugin for Sketch is great for creating hotspots linking screens together and exporting them to the Invision project. It also has the benefit of creating a pretty nice flow diagram.
Wireframe flow diagram
After building the prototype I reviewed it with the project managers to make sure all the necessary features had been accounted for, and asked for feedback. With feedback and approval received, it was time to dig into the design. Click here to read about the design process.
