Account Insights Search Feature

Role

UX Design Intern

Team

Product Manager, Developer, two UX Design Interns (myself included)

Company

CareFirst Blue Cross Blue Shield, a health insurance company serving the DMV area

Duration

August 2021

Account Insights Search Feature

Role

UX Design Intern

Team

Product Manager, Developer, two UX Design Interns (myself included)

Company

CareFirst Blue Cross Blue Shield, a health insurance company serving the DMV area

Duration

August 2021

What is Account Insights?

Account Insights is a reporting tool that allows CareFirst partners to view and evaluate company health insurance data to understand how their employees use health insurance and how much it costs the company.

Account Insights has been through many years of planning and tests, and stands as a redesign of the previous tool called Searchlight. The previous version made it difficult for customers to understand the overall data, what is driving costs, and ways to reduce future healthcare costs. Users often struggled to locate specific data reports, as they would have to navigate through several sections of data, leading to confusion and inefficiency.

My project was to design an intuitive search feature for Account Insights to highlight the most relevant results while also maintaining familiar components.

Product Users

Our target audience is company partners representing CareFirst data

Nancy

HR Director at a mid-sized financial company

Mark

Consultant at a national consulting firm

Steve

CFO at a small tech company

Steve

CFO at a small tech company

User Needs

Based on the user journey maps created during the research phase, I identified specific needs to prioritize in my designs.

Understand the effectiveness of current health plans, in order to keep members engaged and maximize their health insurance benefits

Gain access to real-time data to prove that current benefits are a good investment

Keep costs low to maintain the best deal for clients

Features & Functionalities

My team then ideated on potential design solutions in order to resolve the aforementioned user needs. These are the features that we made sure to prioritize in the following design sketches.

Finding reports at the lower level

Access to reports and information in one place

Search through 150+ reports

Compare data across several years

Search through 150+ reports

Search through 150+ reports

Compare data across several years

Why I looked into Adobe

Since we were working on a search query as well as a search results page, Adobe’s search bar provided direction about organizing information that can be divided into many different sections.

The screenshot below shows the ability to filter, show more results, expand each results section, and pinpoint exactly what was listed within each result.

Why I looked into Amazon

Account insights has several types of reports, and I wanted to see how Amazon enables users to search for a particular keyword within an individual department.

However, this raises the concern that a user might be unsure about the specific department they should look into, so it would be useful to include the option to select multiple departments.

Why I looked into Amazon

Account insights has several types of reports, and I wanted to see how Amazon enables users to search for a particular keyword within an individual department.

However, this raises the concern that a user might be unsure about the specific department they should look into, so it would be useful to include the option to select multiple departments.

Why I looked into Cisco

We wanted to maintain the familiarity of the previous version of the search feature, which included reports divided into reports for financial performance, administrative reports, etc.

The Cisco search feature displays how search results are divided into individual product lines, which would help our target audience separate their searches into different sections.

Why I looked into Cisco

We wanted to maintain the familiarity of the previous version of the search feature, which included reports divided into reports for financial performance, administrative reports, etc.

The Cisco search feature displays how search results are divided into individual product lines, which would help our target audience separate their searches into different sections.

Comparative Analysis

To gather design inspiration for the search tool, I wanted to understand how companies that dealt with a variety of product and service offerings organized their information, so I analyzed the following e-commerce sites. When conducting my competitive analysis, I took screenshots of other competitor’s search bars to call out specific features that would be useful to include in our product. I also note of the interactions present in other sites, to mimic the same design patterns in my sketches.

Design

Taking the user research and market analysis into account, I created sketches and wireframes of the following 2 screens: the search dropdown bar and the expanded search results page. These are some elements I designed:

predictive text and voice typing features — making it easier and faster for users to find their report

titles of reports and images of graphs shown in the same order of the report sections shown in the main page of Account Insights, in order to maintain familiarity

Sketches

I wanted to provide an easier way for the user to quickly see the graphs that were listed in different data reports and be able to sift through results. However, due to technical constraints, this was not feasible.

I wanted to provide an easier way for the user to quickly see the graphs that were listed in different data reports and be able to sift through results. However, due to technical constraints, this was not feasible.

Wireframes

My wireframe of a search query using predictive text

My wireframe of a search query using predictive text

My wireframe of a search query using predictive text

Wireframing the search results page

Wireframing the search results page

Wireframing the search results page

Similar to many other search features, once the user began typing in a specific keyword, there would be several rows of results that would show the most relevant reports. Then I divided them up into the sections that were established in the previous version, to maintain consistency.

Final Designs

Search results section titles maintained from the previous version of the product

Search icon in the menu bar

Predictive text features

Final Designs

Search results

section titles

maintained from

previous version

of the product

Search results section titles maintained from

previous version of the product

Search icon in the menu bar

Predictive text features

User Testing

I then partnered with a market researcher to user test my designs to determine if they were intuitive and simple to navigate. I wrote a user test script, and created multiple tasks for the users to show their process of searching for a report, to understand how they look for information.

Findings

• The layout and stylistic elements of the design were eye-catching and not too cluttered.

• The information presented in the designs was easy to understand.

• The early stage of the design made user test task completion more difficult.

• The layout and stylistic elements of the design were eye-catching and not too cluttered.

• The information presented in the designs was easy to understand.

• The early stage of the design made user test task completion more difficult.

Takeaways

Takeaways

Takeaways

I learned to work with developers and work around technical limitations.

This was my first time working on a design and handing it off to a developer, and the experience helped me gain valuable insights into the importance of clear communication, understanding technical constraints, and finding creative solutions to bridge the gap between design and implementation. This process enhanced my ability to create designs that are intuitive and technically feasible.

I was able to see my designs being developed in a live environment!

Seeing how my designs went from conceptual ideas to implementation helped me validate my design decisions, and provided valuable insights into design implementation. It was very thrilling to see how my designs created tangible impact!