Designing Savio — A fun way to save and earn money for kids.
Role: Solo Product Designer (User Research, UX Design, Interface Design)
Tools Used: Figma, Whimsical, Google meet, Google Docs & Notion
Industry: Fintech (Financial Technology)
Overview
The habit of saving money is a vital skill that needs to be learned over time for sustainability. But it is not an easy thing to do. Inculcating the habit of saving as an individual is one big deal that requires dedication and determination.
Savings is an essential step in building wealth and being financially literate. But unfortunately, this skill and its importance are not taught in many schools. Many of us learned how to save the hard way through trial and experience.
To have a sound financial education, one needs to be trained right from the early stage of life on the importance of this skill. Teaching kids how to save in a fun way would not only help them in life, but they would also be eager to save.
Understanding the Problem
Savio came about as an idea for a side project to help solve a problem. I saw a need to help kids learn this skill, as I also am still learning this skill. I also wanted to work on something different, maybe a new space or new technology that I haven't yet interacted with that still has problems to be solved. I saw the need to help kids learn essential skills for their survival in life.
Not only about teaching them how to save but also making them find house chores fun to do. They need a push to learn how to do chores and tasks in a fun and rewarding way, which they’d be glad always to do. This instills the habit of survival into them.
Nowadays, little kids already own mobile devices, either requested by their school or as a gift from parents. There’s a need to help them utilize this and make good use of it.
What goals do I aim to achieve?
With a careful understanding of the impact of savings in our life as an individual — and kids, I have selected a list of goals that this project aims to meet to solve the problems and help make this learning phase fun for kids.
- Fun experience: Giving kids that fun experience while learning and doing home chores/tasks would give them a better experience.
- Accessibility: The project aims not only to be accessible to kids but can be used by everyone.
- Inclusivity: Inclusive design describes methodologies to create products that understand and enable people of all backgrounds and abilities.
- Simplicity: The project also aims to be simple and solve an existing complexity problem when using other savings apps.
This product was designed with the kids in mind but can also be used by their parents to set tasks, chores, and rewards they claim after completing each chore/task.
Who are my users?
- Primary users: Kids between 6–10 years of age.
- Secondary users: Parents of kids who help set tasks and give rewards
Understanding my users
To kick off, I started by doing a bunch of desk research; reading articles, watching children closely, and studying what keeps them hooked. Understanding what makes them happy and motivated to do home chores — even if they never wanted to do it.
I approached the interviews by asking parents about their kids' saving habits and willingness to do chores. I was curious to find a way to make children happy when doing any task given to them. I also interviewed the kids to understand them better well. A significant constraint, however, was that most kids I interviewed had not started using a mobile device. Only very few own a mobile device. This meant I could only interact with a handful of kids to understand what type of apps they interact with.
My main aim was to understand how to motivate kids to save more and get rewarded for tasks. From this, I hoped to gain insight into the basic decision-making process.
I started interviewing kids by asking them open questions to get insights on how they save money to accomplish a goal, understand their motivations, and how they go about rewards.
I further interviewed parents to understand how their kids get tasks done, what motivates them, and what keeps them hooked, among other questions.
User personas
Synthesizing the data from the interviews enabled me to identify the primary user behavior patterns and motivations. I used the qualitative data I gathered during the research process to create two personas representing the users.
Ideating & Designing
Digital Wireframes
In this phase, I created digital wireframes to validate the flow and test out possible visual elements used in the design. I spent enough time iterating while creating the layout for specific features and trying to keep the product simple, accessible, and precise.
High Fidelity Designs
I started designing high-fidelity prototypes right after designing the wireframes. During this phase, I designed high-quality interface designs following all guides I created for the project. Iterations were done while working on this phase, as I deleted, modified, and added screens to make the whole user process simple and flawless, thereby increasing user experience.
Learning and takeaways
This was a fascinating and fun project for me to work on as it provided real value and involved empathy. And understanding of the behaviors of the primary users. I learned about always designing for inclusivity. No one should automatically be unable to use your product before they even get to decide for themselves.
I had to go through multiple iterations while designing Savio to arrive at a version that is accessible and fun to use by the users.
The Impact
Savio app is not only a savings app but a product that teaches kids to save and have a sound financial education. They need to be trained right from the early stage of life on the importance of this skill. Creating achievable goals and saving money to accomplish them.
It also serves as a mini task management app where kids complete tasks and get rewarded for doing them. They get to track their activities and completed tasks.
Thanks for reading
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