Testing a sustainable investment platform with prospective users

An investment firm planned to launch an app-based sustainable investing service. They wanted to test the prototype before investing in development or approaching potential partners.

• What we did

  • Survey of 250 ‘moderate greens’ 

  • 20 remote user tests

• My role & credits

  • Role: Moderator. I ran 6 user tests, working with a wider team of moderators to synthesise insight and build our final report.

  • Agency: Two Igloos

• Results

  • Identified phrases that the target audience understood, and terms to avoid.

  • Highlighted sections and themes that resonated with users – insights that would support partner conversations.

  • Surfaced challenges and potential pain points, with recommendations on how to solve these.

The project

Consumer survey

Using a consumer panel, we surveyed 250 ‘moderate greens’ who planned to invest in the coming year. This allowed us to build a picture of the target audience for this service.

As part of this survey we tested respondent confidence across a range of terminology. We advised the client to provide explanations or exercise caution when using certain expressions.

User tests

We conducted 20 remote user tests using a click-through prototype of the onboarding flow. We opted to run the tests on a usability platform that allowed users to join a video call from their mobile phone, and allowed moderators to observe both the user and their screen as they used the prototype.

In our research summary we presented five key takeouts.

Research insights

We gathered our insights around the hypotheses we had set out to test. One hypothesis that we disproved was that the onboarding flow was too long and would deter users. In testing, users felt that signing up for an investment service should be detailed to ensure each person gets the portfolio that is right for them. They expected this detail to take time.

We also highlighted specific sections of the flow in our report. A particularly strong part was an illustrative section that showed the impact a person's money could have.

An example hypothesis slide.