Splend
A mobile app to help you keep track of all the money you spend.
Splend is a personal project inspired by my internships in banking. I worked on personal finance tools to help people spend and save better. Many struggle to save because they often forget how much they've spent, only to realize they've overspent too late. I want to help people be more mindful of their daily spending so they can stay on top of their finances.
Problem Statement
Money spent is money forgotten. How can we help users become more mindful of their expenses?
Outcome
I designed a mobile app to help users set up and mindfully track their expenses with voice commands.
User Research
Results & Findings
I conducted one-on-one interviews with 5 users, most were young adults with little to no formal financial education.
It’s easy to forget about money after it’s spent
Some users have no idea how much money they’ve spent in the past week, month, or year. Others have some ideas, but they’re uncertain what and where they’ve spent money.
Some users don’t track expenses at all. It takes time and effort. Others use automated tools to track, but forget they’re tracking because the tool does it all.
There's a learning curve to managing money
Users don’t know where to start. They’re intimidated by the learning curve of finance tools and avoid dealing with their finances day-to-day.
Features
More and more people are turning to automated tools to track expenses. It’s easy - just link your bank account, and the tool tracks everything for you.
Splend takes a different approach. To help users truly understand their expenses, users enter expenses themselves. But I’ve made this as easy as possible with mobile design.
Feature 1: Onboard
Users don’t know where to start when it comes to their finances. Splend makes starting easy.
What Changed? Before & After
Recognition rather than recall
Instead of starting from a “blank slate”, where users had to add their own expense categories, I added categories to choose from. Users may not remember all their expense categories - recognizing the categories, alongside definitions and examples makes set up a lot easier.
Help users recognize and recover from errors
I added a step to review and edit the expense setup without needing to return to the original screen. I chose to use a bar graph to show a summary of users' setup, so users can clearly review categories they’ve allocated the most to the least amount of money.
Less is more
I minimized on-screen information by breaking down the set up into smaller steps. This helps users feel less overwhelmed.
Feature 2: Voice Commands
I wanted to make it as easy as possible for users to track their expenses on the go. Splend makes it easy with voice commands.
Design Iteration
Before
Small screens and long form fields made it inconvenient to input expenses.
Design Iteration Before
Small screens and long form fields made it inconvenient to input expenses.
Design Iteration
After
On mobile, there are built-in input features. Camera. Microphone. Why not take advantage of them?
On mobile, there are built-in input features. Why not take advantage of them? Camera. Microphone.
Why Voice?
Voice is convenient
As users spend on the go, they can also track on the go, hands-free. This simplifies and speeds up expense tracking, taking away the challenges that come with typing on small screens.
Voice is mindful
Research shows that verbalizing, for instance through voice inputs, increases awareness of your actions. This goes beyond simply taking and uploading a picture of your receipt or automating your expense tracking.
It's important to note, voice may not be accessible to all users, whether those in loud areas or unable to use their voice. As such, users can also type in their expenses.
Feature 3: Thumb-friendly
I wanted to make it as easy as possible for users to activate controls on the go. This means making controls within thumb-reach.
Feature 4: Review expenses
Users can review their expenses using the filter and sort. They can also edit or delete entries.
Style Guide
Splend helps users become more mindful for their spending. To reflect this, I chose calm and cool colours like blue and green. I also wanted the app to feel friendly and easy to use everyday. I chose rounded-corners shapes and sans serif fonts.
Reflection
This was my first UX design project and I had lots of fun! Reflecting on my experience, I learned two important lessons.
Enhance the user, not the product
I didn't need to design the "best" app to track expenses - I needed to design the app to help users become the best at tracking their expenses. Therefore, I focused on designing features to help users build the skills, habits, and mindsets to truly become better at personal finance.
Extension to daily life
To ensure users would use it on their day to day, I needed to design an app that would extend already existing parts of their life. Therefore, I focused on designing features to make it as easy and convenient as possible. This meant leveraging the strengths of mobile design.
