Quick Advise

Lowering the barrier to entry for Nonprofit members to receive support on Catchafire

Client
Catchafire

Year
2024

Role
UX Research

Product Strategy

User testing

Product design

Nonprofit members post a question

Volunteers answer targeted questions from their dashboard

Overview

As UX Director at Catchafire, I led the design of Quick Advise, a new asynchronous engagement type that enables nonprofits to post questions and receive written responses from skilled volunteers. The feature was developed to provide fast engagement with low commitment, removing scheduling barriers that existed with traditional consultation methods.

Catchafire is an online platform that connects nonprofits with skilled volunteers who can help with operational and capacity-building needs. Through their marketplace, nonprofits can post projects for everything from website development to strategic planning, and professionals can volunteer their skills pro-bono. The platform pre-scopes projects and facilitates virtual connections, making it easier for nonprofits to access high-quality talent regardless of their funding.

Catchafire serves nearly 15,000 nonprofits and has access to 10 million professionals, making it the largest virtual capacity-building community.

Challenge

Despite being taken through a first listing prompt, only 21% of nonprofit members were posting a project or call after completing registration. Our metrics showed that if they did not post within their first visit, they would be unlikely to return.

Research & Discovery

How might we lower the barrier to posting so that Nonprofits will feel confident to post on their first visit?

Our analysis of user behavior patterns & interview revealed several key insights

First-time platform users showed hesitation when prompted to post longer commitments

Nonprofit users were creating workarounds by scheduling calls with nonprofit advisors

Skeptical Nonprofits were looking for ways to vet the platform before fully comitting

Design Process

We researched leading

Build a website experience guided by three main customer-centric principles

Guide them through the process

Provide Clear, easy CTAs for acquisitions and services
Tell them about other products related to their needs
Give persistent live access to customer service

Show customers you know them

Prioritize landing page experience based on customer type (new vs. existing)
Provide a streamlined path to account access
Automatically identify their closest branch & ATMs
Provide a consistent experience across any device

Focus on their goals

Integrate financial education resources
Take a goal-oriented approach to products
Provide tools and education to support product selection
Serve up personalized content, relevant to the customer based on their stage of life and financial literacy

Site Architecture

By mapping the customer needs states, I was able to identify what features and functionality customers would need at each step of their engagement with WSFS.

I applied this organizational prioritization to the site architecture, ensuring that the site can serve the appropriate content to customers when and where they need it.

Personal banking customer need states

UI & Wireframes

Built on the Magento CMS, the site needed to have flexible and dynamic components that established easy-to-follow patterns for customers to navigate through product pages and application flows without friction.

Navigation

A double ribbon navigation structure was created to support easy findabilty across audience types and their associated products and services.

UX/UI

A design system was established with components that were organized into 12 flexible page template types, covering for the range of content and functionality that the site needed to include.

Product overview page template

Audience landing page

Quick Advise

Overview

Challenge

Research & Discovery

Design Process