Building Trust and Clarity in a Mobile Investment Experience
Bitkogan is an investment education and portfolio-based guidance platform. This project involved a complete redesign of the mobile application, focusing on improving usability and trust.
Business goals
Increase portfolio subscription conversion
Improve discovery and navigation across portfolios
Strengthen user confidence during evaluation
Research & Direction
To understand where and why users were struggling, I combined behavioral data analysis with qualitative observation — looking beyond drop-off points to uncover what users were missing at key decision moments.
The research revealed two core issues:
Unclear evaluation signals. During portfolio review, users struggled to understand performance, risk, and strategy, leading to hesitation and high abandonment before purchase.
Overwhelming discovery. As the platform scaled, the lack of structured navigation, search, and filtering made it difficult to compare options and confidently take the next step.
To reduce hesitation in portfolio discovery, I structured the exploration flow around clear evaluation signals and guided refinement.
Show me what I care
On portfolios list page, users looked for immediate validation: focus, risk level, and historical performance.
Instead of adding more information, the design prioritized surfacing the right signals at the right moment. Risk level and success rate were elevated within the hierarchy to support faster, more confident decisions.
Before
After
Expected return was removed to prevent misinterpretation as guaranteed profit
Help me focus on what matters to me
As portfolio options expanded, discovery became harder. Users lacked tools to narrow choices or compare strategies efficiently.
I restructured discovery by introducing detailed filtering, search, and behavior-driven recommendations. Exploration shifted from passive browsing to focused decision-making.
Deepening Understanding & Engagement
Once clarity and discovery improved, I expanded the experience to
reinforce context and long-term confidence.
Stock-Level Visibility
To increase transparency, stock tickers were surfaced alongside lightweight performance visualizations.
Users could evaluate individual assets without leaving the portfolio view, strengthening their understanding of how each position contributed to overall strategy.
AI-Powered Guidance
An in-app AI assistant provided immediate answers to stock and portfolio-related questions.
Rather than leaving the platform to research independently, users could resolve uncertainty within the same decision flow.
34% increase in decision confidence
As observed in usability testing, users were able to understand portfolio performance faster and make more confident decisions after key signals were prioritized.