Global
Insurance
Company
Personalisation, Transparency & Engagement
In a fast-paced, one-month client project, I collaborated with 20 UX/UI designers to redesign a global insurer’s website and service presentation.
As Final Presentation and Design System Lead, among other research and design roles, I worked with my team to refine key UX drivers, optimise the sales funnel, and enhance TNPS, delivering a user-centric solution aligned with the client brief.
My Roles
Research
Heuristic Evaluation
Survey Research
Personas
Problem Statement
Leadership
Team Lead - Final Client Presentation
Team Lead - Design System
Design
Ideation
Sketches
Information Architecture
High Fidelity Prototype
The Project
August 2024
1 Month
Team of 20
Tools
Figma
Photoshop
Delivery
Desktop
Problem Statment
Many potential customers, regardless of whether they currently have life insurance, find the concepts confusing, struggle with unclear terms, and face challenges navigating complex websites with insufficient resources.
To empower customers to make informed decisions and enhance their likelihood of choosing ‘Global Insurer’s’ Life Insurance product, we need to offer clear, concise information, intuitive comparison tools, and easily accessible guidance.
Research
Uncovering Usability Issues and Boosting TNPS in a Competitive Insurance Landscape
Heuristic Evaluation
Given the competitive nature of the insurance industry and the complexity of legal information presented to users, we selected heuristic evaluation as a key research method.
This approach helped us identify usability issues early, uncover friction points in the user journey, and highlight opportunities to improve clarity and engagement.
By benchmarking against competitors, we gained actionable insights to refine the experience and drive measurable improvements in Transactional Net Promoter Score (TNPS).
Top 3 Heuristic Insights
Simplifying Insurance Language – Many existing websites use complex insurance jargon without explanations, making it difficult for users to understand the content.
Clarifying Product Differentiation – The Zurich website does not clearly communicate that Ezicover is a simplified DIY product with more basic cover than standard life insurance and income protection.
Enhancing Self-Service Options – Many competitor websites direct users to customer service as first point of call.
Price, Personalisation & Assistance
Survey Insights
Top 3 User Needs from Survey
Price
Personalisation
Needing assistance in selecting and understanding products
We cross-analyzed surevy data and affinity-mapped key focus areas with interview insights and heuristic evaluations to identify gaps and determine the best way to incorporate user-driven insights into the final design.
User Interviews
Refine
Identifying Key Themes and Universal Insights to Shape the Final Design
Affinity Mapping
Affinity mapping synthesised data from surveys, interviews, and heuristic analysis. Some user insights were specific to age, family and financial circumstances. However, there were common global themes that were consistent across all user groups, underpinning much of the final designs, user's perceptions and behaviour.
Empathy maps built primarily from interview findings and qualitative survey data, shaped persona behaviours—what users think, feel, and say—while demographic-specific needs, wants, and pain points were gathered from quantitative surveys and interviews, ensuring well-rounded personas that went beyond demographics to capture key decision-making motivators; journey mapping, like heuristics, helped identify pain points in the quoting process but did not capture the diverse insurance needs of varied user groups.
Personas were a critical artifact in defining our problem space and developing our final design.
Universality & Personalisation
User Personas
The site served a diverse range of users, requiring a balance between addressing global pain points and personalising the experience. To meet the brief and increase TNPS, we refined user behaviours through personas, ensuring a universal system that had a strong information scent for varied users’ needs. Empathy maps and survey data really underpinned these personas and their user stories were key to reflecting varied users real world behaviour. These 4 evidence backed artefacts were key to demonstrating our design solution in the final client presenation.
Meet our 4 user personas:
User Persona: Skeptical Minimalist
User Persona: Family Protector
User Persona: Independent Researcher
User Persona: Carefully Curious
Design
A Catalyst for Delivery, Driving Home Global Pain points & User Stories
How Might We?
Brainstorming and ideation began with "How might we" statements in mind, ensuring our solutions addressed key user needs, while closed card sorting, sketching, and Crazy 8s helped refine ideas before committing to wireframes and high-fidelity prototypes.
Casting the Net Wide
Ideation
Brainstorming
Refinement
Minimum Viable Product
Sketches
Creating meaning and recognition from complex and internally focused navigation.
Information Architecture
Based on heuristic analysis and initial user testing of the original “Global Insurance Company’s” website, it was clear that “Global Insurer’s navigation was not intuitive. Reviewing information architecture through an open card sort was our first step to iterating and improving the information scent for users, meeting user needs and the clients intent to improve TNPS. . scent, for users users with information scent and intuitive Navigation Informing Navigation and prioritising user Information scent to meet cleint brief and user needs - would be a piece about nav and how poor it was before
Design Iteration to ensure an optimised solution
User Testing
We tested the duration it originally took users to find the specified & product complete a quote.
Our results clearly showed that the revisied navigation and understandability of information was much more intuitive and resulted in a dramatic improvement from the original site’s TNPS and quote conversion.
The Solution
5 Evidence Backed Solutions
Reducing Mental Load to Increase TNPS
New Navigation
We redesigned the navigation menu with user-centric flows and jargon-free labels, tailored to reflect our core personas. This approach improved clarity and ease of use but also addressed global gaps and opportunities identified through research.
Varied Needs Met with One Solution
Personalised Coverage Tool
The personalised coverage quiz streamlines the user journey by cutting through excess information and guiding users to the ideal product based on their individual needs and inputs. This targeted, persona-driven approach boosts user confidence, reduces skepticism, and strengthens the client's sales funnel and TNPS by helping users reach their tailored solution with greater clarity and speed.
Side by Side Product Comparisons Tailored to the User
Product Comparison Tool
After completing the personalised coverage quiz, users are shown a side-by-side comparison of insurance products tailored to their needs. Based on research, price was at the top of the information hierarchy, reflecting its importance in user decision making. Users also expressed skepticism toward large blocks of text, so we introduced concise summaries with optional CTAs to learn more or proceed to the quote stage. This approach reduced cognitive load, built trust, and improved the sales funnel by guiding users toward conversion sooner and with greater clarity and confidence.
High Fidelity Prototype - Personalised Coverage Tool with Product comparison
Increasing Trust, Clarity and Engagement by Reducing Information Overload
Interactive Policy Page
An interactive policy page retains all of the important legal information for the client, but allows users to explore policies at their own pace without overwhelm or dense blocks of text. By breaking content into dynamic, clickable sections, we maintained transparency while improving trust and readability. This approach empowers users with choice, reduces cognitive load, and supports a more confident, informed path to purchase.
On-Demand Help for Confident Coverage Choices
AI Chat Bot
Insurance can be complex, and our research showed that most users made insurance product decisions with the help of another person. Implementing an AI-powered virtual assistant supports this behaviour by providing real-time answers to common questions, reducing laborious searches through dense policy information. It creates a more interactive, efficient experience that builds confidence and supports users in making informed choices independently.
Reflection & Next Steps
Strengths, Challenges & What I’d Change
Research
Survey Insights
Our survey leaned to heavily on qualitative responses, making it harder to extract usable quantitative data for our final pitch. While we gained valuable behavioural insights, a more balanced question set and a dedicated lead for survey design could have improved data quality.Personas that Drove Design
Our personas were executed with depth and clarity. They became essential reference points, aligning the team and client around the user needs that shaped our final design decisions.Mapping Emotions to Insight
Affinity mapping helped us identify key themes across interviews, while empathy maps gave voice to users’ strong emotions, concerns, and skepticism—particularly around insurance. Though not always the most effective tool, in this case, empathy mapping offered a meaningful lens through which to view our data. Personas were then built from these insights.Heuristic Review as a Competitive Baseline
The heuristic evaluation provided a solid foundation to identify usability gaps and meet client expectations. While it didn't directly influence user behaviour, it helped highlight opportunities to meet—and in some cases exceed—competitor standards. It supported the design process as a complementary tool.
Design
Improving Design System Collaboration
Our design system lacked clear guidance and consistent communication, which made cohesive collaboration across the team more challenging.Advocating for a Single Source of Truth
In future projects, I’d strongly advocate for a unified, single-page design system. This would streamline access, reduce confusion, and improve efficiency by giving all team members one clear, consistent source of truth for components and design rules.
Product Road Map
Phase 1: Quick Wins
Implement New Navigation & Information Architecture
Phase 2: Must Haves
Personalised Coverage Tool
Ezicover Interactive Policy Page
Nice to Haves:
Product Comparison Tool
AI Chat Bot
Client Testimonial
“It has been an enlightening experience collaborating with the team over the last 4 weeks, to see what amazing work talented people can deliver in such a short timeframe. The challenge we gave the team was centred around optimising a sales funnel via the web channel. All of our stakeholders have been very impressed by the outputs that both challenge our thinking, and provide a pathway to re-engineer user flows to achieve our objective.”
Head of Customer Experience
Global Insurance Company