Designing a simpler path to peace of mind: a new life insurance journey for NZAA
Following a major business acquisition, NZAA's life insurance product required a complete overhaul to increase its competitiveness in the New Zealand market. The goal was to design an entirely new, user-friendly application journey from the ground up. As the lead UX designer, I was tasked with leading the team through an agile process to define, design, and validate this critical new experience.
Team
I led a UX team of two, working closely with a Solution Architect and a Tech Lead to ensure our designs were both user-centred and technically viable.
Timeline
8 weeks (four 2-week design sprints for research and design)
Tools
Figma, Miro
From daunting to doable
While NZAA's existing life insurance application journey was functional, in a competitive market, 'functional' was no longer enough. To achieve NZAA's goal of becoming a market leader, the experience needed to transform from merely adequate to exceptional, necessitating a comprehensive overhaul.
The old journey was cumbersome. Customers faced repetitive questions and a lengthy completion time. A significant point of frustration was discovering they were ineligible for a product only after investing considerable time and effort into the application. Compounding this was the fact the journey was not optimised for mobile, and its outdated design felt inconsistent with NZAA's other modern digital products.
Applying for life insurance is an inherently daunting process, filled with complex terminology and legal disclaimers. This led to our guiding mission: how do we transform an intimidating and inefficient process into a simple, guided journey that empowers users and gives them confidence?
THE CHALLENGE
Defining a clearer path forward
To transform the journey from 'daunting to doable', our team established a set of clear principles that would address both the core user frustrations and the key business problem of customer drop-off.
The user problem
Professionals were forced to use a confusing, inconsistent, and inefficient system. The fragmented navigation and complex terminology led to daily frustration and wasted time.
The business problem
NZAA was experiencing a high drop-off rate between the quote and final application stages. This suggested the cumbersome and untrustworthy experience was actively preventing potential customers from completing their journey, directly impacting business growth.
Our goals
Provide a fast and transparent quote in under two minutes. We aimed to radically shorten the time to get a quote. A key part of this was assessing eligibility upfront, giving users the confidence to continue to a full application.
Design a dynamic and intelligent application flow. The new journey had to feel smart and respectful of the user's time. This meant reducing repetitive input and only presenting questions and products that were relevant to the customer based on their previous answers.
Reduce friction and build trust to decrease drop-off. Ultimately, every design decision was aimed at creating a simpler, more guided experience that would build user confidence and reduce the number of people abandoning the journey.
MY ROLE & CONTRIBUTIONS
Leading an agile team to a clearer design
My role on this project was to lead the design effort within a highly structured, 8-week agile process. This was a great opportunity for me to step into a more strategic position, mentoring a junior designer and guiding the overall UX vision while ensuring our process was efficient and effective.
My key contributions included:
Designing the sprint process: I designed our 8-week workflow, breaking the project into four 2-week sprints that aligned with the four key steps of the pre-defined customer journey. For each sprint, I established a repeatable process of rapid design, prototyping, client feedback, and usability testing.
Mentoring and design direction: As I was only partly allocated to this project, my primary focus was on mentoring and guiding our other UX designer. I provided daily direction, helped facilitate key workshops, and ensured the quality and consistency of the design output.
Establishing a design system: To enable our small team to work efficiently, I established the foundations of a design system in Figma. This provided the building blocks our designer needed to produce all the necessary screens consistently and at pace.
Strategic oversight: Overall, I was responsible for the strategic oversight of the user experience, ensuring that each step of the new application journey was validated by users and aligned with the project's core goals.
The first iteration of wireframes for the product selection journey
THE PROCESS
An eight-week journey to a simpler application
Our agile process of rapid design and weekly user testing was designed to challenge our assumptions from the very first sprint. Here is how our understanding of the user evolved.
Challenging our assumptions about simplicity
We began with a common assumption: for a "tedious" topic, users would want the simplest screens with the fewest clicks. In our first sprint, we tested two design variations for the initial application steps. The results were surprising. While users did prefer the option with a more direct path, they also expressed suspicion towards pages with very little text. They expected a serious topic like life insurance to have descriptive content, and this insight immediately challenged our "less is more" hypothesis.
Discovering the importance of context
In a later sprint, we tested designs for supplementary and support content. Here, we found the opposite behaviour. Users were not only willing to click more to access detailed information, they were actively seeking it out. This confirmed our evolving understanding: the user's desire for simplicity was highly context-dependent. For the core application, they wanted efficiency; for making their decision, they wanted comprehensive support.
Synthesising our learnings into design principles
By the end of our research sprints, we had a much more nuanced understanding of our users' needs. We synthesised these discoveries into three core design principles that would guide the final design:
Keep the core journey efficient, but provide descriptive content. Users expected to read and were willing to do so to make an informed decision.
Offer comprehensive support, on demand. Provide easy access to supplementary information, even if it requires an extra click to not overwhelm the main journey.
Surface value early. Present positive "sweeteners" like member discounts as early as possible to build goodwill and delight.
THE SOLUTION
A journey built on confidence and clarity
The new application journey was designed from the ground up based on our three core principles. Each screen and interaction was crafted to be efficient, supportive, and to build user confidence. The following features are key examples of our principles in action.
Keep the core journey efficient, but provide descriptive content
On the 'Product Selection' screen, we needed to balance simplicity with the user's need for detailed information. The final design features clean, simple product cards that a user can select to get a quote. However, each card can also be expanded to reveal more detail. This allows confident users to move quickly, while enabling those who need more information to make an informed decision without ever leaving the main journey.
Offer comprehensive support, on demand
For users who were still unsure which products were right for them, we provided an optional, secondary journey. By answering a few simple lifestyle questions, users receive a personalised product suggestion. These recommendations are then highlighted back on the main selection screen. This 'help me choose' feature provides an extra layer of guided support for those who need it, without complicating the process for those who don't.
Surface value early
Early in the quote journey, we introduced a simple screen asking if the user is an AA member. This allowed us to immediately highlight the member discount, creating a positive 'sweetener' from the beginning. The design also reassures non-members that they can sign up later to receive the same discount, and allows users to skip and add their member number at the end. This flexible approach communicates a key benefit without creating a barrier.
THE IMPACT
A confident path to launch
While the new journey is yet to launch, the final designs have been met with glowing feedback from business stakeholders. Their confidence comes not only from the improved, user-friendly interface but also from the rigorous, user-centred process we followed.
By grounding every design decision in real-world user feedback from our weekly usability tests, we were able to de-risk the project. The business now has a high degree of confidence that the new journey is not just aesthetically better but is a validated solution that truly meets the needs of their customers.
LEARNINGS & REFLECTIONS
Key lessons and future opportunities
Build the process around the user, literally. My biggest process lesson was the need to build flexibility into a rigid sprint schedule. We discovered that arranging user testing sessions early in the week was difficult for participants. In the future, I would consult with our recruitment agency before finalising sprint timelines with stakeholders to ensure our plan is built around the user's availability, not just our own.
Create a roadmap for the future. A key outcome of our work was uncovering a range of new feature requirements that were outside our initial scope. The immediate next step for NZAA is to take these valuable insights, prioritise them in a product backlog, and plan future design sprints to continue iterating and improving the customer journey long after this initial launch.
