To retain such an audience, a mobile app with thoughtful onboarding that helps users master investments and choose relevant products is essential. For asset management companies offering services through a website's personal account, creating such a service is a challenge.
What approaches should be adopted, and what qualities and features should be emphasized? We explain using the experience of one asset management company. In 2020-2021, we conducted three studies for this company, helping to align their product strategy with audience expectations in three areas: registration and starting investments, retaining newcomers in the service, and increasing portfolios for experienced investors.
The company holds a leading position in the market, and digital channels enable them to convey the value of their offerings to a broad audience and provide convenient tools for portfolio management. Collaborating with Markswebb helped eliminate bottlenecks in the customer journey and improve operational efficiency.
The collaboration resulted in growth across all key product metrics and the company's app being recognized as the best among asset management companies in the Digital Investment Rank 2021.
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In May 2020, Markswebb investigated the client company's app to identify barriers that new users face when interacting with the product. A desk audit and usability testing with respondents revealed that new clients encounter more problems at the very beginning of their journey:
First, it should help new clients complete the registration process without losing motivation. Second, it should provide basic knowledge about investments and help users gain their first benefits from the product.
Choosing the first product: In the client company, there is no separate account opening process to buy products later. Buying the first product is the registration itself. Most new users are not familiar with this specificity, so they spend time looking for the "Registration" section and feel uncertain.
To solve this problem, the app can focus clients' attention on the first step. The client company started showing a "How to Start Investing" story in the guest area, which explains step by step how to get into investments, choose a product, fill out a form, and fund an account. This information can also be added to the product card where the client begins registration.
Registration and form filling: After choosing a product, users faced a routine process of filling out numerous fields and waiting for the system's verification results. To keep the client engaged, unnecessary steps were removed from the registration process, and the remaining steps were made clear and visual.
Developers at the client company redesigned the form: highlighting mandatory fields, adding passport scanning, and offering convenient registration methods. The tax ID no longer needs to be entered manually; it can be automatically loaded via the "Find Tax ID" button. After verification, clients receive SMS and push notifications that the app is ready to use.
Determining the investment strategy: After registration, users need to understand the specifics of investing with the company and the products. For example, some inexperienced users thought they were investing in a single company when choosing a mutual fund and tried to select it from a list of issuers.
To address this issue, the client company's developers implemented onboarding mechanisms: collections like "Where to Start for Beginners," top-3 current investment ideas on the main screen, and filters for currency, amount, and product types in the product showcase.
As a result of the first wave, Markswebb researchers provided 138 recommendations for service development, about 100 of which were implemented by the end of 2020. This resolved a significant product issue by eliminating key barriers for beginners.
In August 2020, the client company and Markswebb continued to study the audience. This time, they examined the behavior and motivation of investors to understand how to retain already registered clients. Respondents with initial investment experience who had been using the app for no more than six months were selected for the study.
Interviews showed that the audience did not fully understand the specifics of investing through the company, often downloading the app impulsively through recommendations or ads, and then trying to figure out the product.
The developers' task was to consider the motivations and clearly demonstrate that investment tools could be more effective than deposits and other saving methods.
The client company actively addressed the motivations highlighted in the interviews. For example, the study clearly identified a segment of clients interested in investments due to lower deposit rates and seeking ways to earn more over the same period—they purchase several products with minimal amounts and monitor the results. For such clients, the company offered new products with a low entry amount and launched marketing campaigns like "Cashback for Investments."
In the new wave of research, which began in February 2021, the Markswebb team studied the behavior of experienced users to understand how to stimulate portfolio growth. The project conducted 16 tests and identified over a hundred observations, resulting in 68 problems. Each problem was accompanied by a recommendation for resolution.
The results showed that even with deeper service immersion and investment experience, clients could still feel confused when searching for investment ideas, choosing products, or analyzing returns. Users needed more targeted communications and offers that considered their behavior and investment style. Standard selections like "Recommended for You" and "Personalized Offers" were perceived as ads in the app and were ineffective.
Convenient and informative product cards: First, developers at the client company significantly redesigned the product card, rewrote all descriptions, made sales points clearer, and added a "Useful" block with information for beginners, details about the fund manager, and product presentations and videos.
Some investors were confused by seeing two charts on the product screen—investments and funds. Clear hints explaining the amounts above the charts, when contributions were made, and how the value changed over time helped resolve this issue.
Implementing a personalized approach to investors: Digital services provide broad opportunities for building personalized communications. Clients see products selected based on extensive data analysis, portfolio composition, activity, and analysis of other users with similar behavior.
These features are still in the testing phase. However, the pilot already shows good results—the amount of deposits from clients with personalized offers is five times higher than from clients with popular products.
The earlier the onboarding, the higher the chance that the user will make a purchase. Beginners are unfamiliar with the registration process and look for familiar buttons: it is essential to explain right away that everything starts with purchasing a product. From the very first screens, it should be clear which product can be chosen and how to start the process.
Automating the form increases its conversion rate. Filling out forms is the most routine part of registration. It is important to minimize manual input: implement recognition of details from photos, automatic loading of tax IDs from databases, and direct integration with the interdepartmental system.
Personalized offers work effectively only with precise targeting. Investors do not trust generic headlines like "Interesting" and "Recommended." They expect advice based on their own activity, portfolio analysis, and strategies. Such offers increase transactional activity.
The more detailed the investment product description, the easier it is to understand if it is suitable for purchase. An experienced investor adds new products to their portfolio based on personal considerations. The app should provide maximum clear tools for decision-making: understandable charts in the product cards, information about funds, and video presentations.
This case study demonstrates a comprehensive approach to enhancing an investment app through targeted user research and tailored solutions. By focusing on user needs and preferences, the project achieved substantial improvements in engagement and key product metrics.
Every year we conduct up to 15 studies of digital services. These are industry benchmarks that reflect the state of the market and trends.
