The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
From Onboarding to Marketplace: Building The Globe’s Advisor Ecosystem
From Onboarding to Marketplace: Building The Globe’s Advisor Ecosystem
Transforming complex workflows into intuitive, scalable digital experiences.
The Task: To support a data migration project
The Client: The Globe and Mail
My Role: Product Designer
Skills involved: user research, product design, service mapping, systems design, automation mapping, interaction design, prototyping, wireframing.
Tools: Figma, Miro
Timeline: 8 months for major release - ongoing iterations and improvements
A fixed launch date and thousands of active users
We had to launch Find an Advisor, migrate thousands of advisor records and reroute the data pipelines behind them, all without disrupting service for advisors already on the platform.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
Who owned what
I led
Advisor dashboard design
User research
Onboarding flow and branching logic
I partnered
Find an Advisor tiers and naming
Service and automation mapping, with data and engineering
Vendor evaluation and selection, with the PM
Find an Advisor tiers and naming
The team owned
Vendor configuration and QA
Launch operations
Pipeline and migration engineering
The decision that shaped the build
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
Chose a builder platform vs a developer heavy build
With few internal developers and a fixed launch date, building custom wasn't realistic. We compared 10 vendors on workflow automation, user friendliness, adaptive to legacy systems and compliance with security criteria. We picked one that made it simple to create built-in automations covering most of what advisors needed, so design effort went into the experience, not the plumbing.
Shorter onboarding for new and returning advisors
The old onboarding relied on long, dated forms that people abandoned. The new flow:
Breaks sign-up into short guided steps
Uses branching logic to send new and returning advisors down the right path
Works on desktop and mobile
It also reduced errors and manual profile fixes for internal teams.
A dashboard advisors could manage themselves
Advisors needed to have their credentials verified by support in order to update their details. While onboarding solves this issue, I designed a new dashboard where they could edit their profile and business information, manage what clients see and edit any of their information on their own. Ultimately, it gives advisors freedom to make changes while cutting the support load for internal teams.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
ENTRY POINTS
LANDING
STANDARD LOGIN — APPLY
NOT INTERESTED PATH
LOGIN SUPPRESSED PATH
OUTCOME
Not Interested
Email Blast
GA Regwall
Opt-in Gate
Globe Account
Page
Advisor
Landing Page
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Not Interested
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Firm Type+Role
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Confirmation
Profile Submitted
Homepage
Return URL
Article Page
END
Not Interested
Login Suppressed (Existing User)
Shared
Standard Login (Apply)
ENTRY POINTS
LANDING
STANDARD LOGIN — APPLY
NOT INTERESTED PATH
LOGIN SUPPRESSED PATH
OUTCOME
Not Interested
Email Blast
GA Regwall
Opt-in Gate
Globe Account
Page
Advisor
Landing Page
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Not Interested
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Firm Type+Role
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Confirmation
Profile Submitted
Homepage
Return URL
Article Page
END
Not Interested
Login Suppressed (Existing User)
Shared
Standard Login (Apply)
Rebuilding the data flows behind it
Behind the screens, I mapped how advisor data needed to move so engineering could reroute the pipelines and migrate thousands of records without downtime.
Consumers
Financial advisors
People
Experiences
Find an advisor search
Onboarding & dashboard
Admin & review
Platform
Backrooms
Location, compare profiles
Branching sign up, self serve profile
Looking for an advisor nearby
New & returning
The Globe teams
Sales, support, editorial
Approve profiles, manage tiers
Advisor records
One source of truth
Workflow automations
One source of truth
Paid tiers
Visibility and customization
Rerouted data pipelines
SSO, Globe Advisor, Find an Advisor
Migrated advisor records
Thousands with zero downtime
Find an Advisor: a new product and revenue stream
The rebuilt system powered Find an Advisor, a consumer search tool for finding advisors nearby. Advisors could pay for higher tiers with more visibility and customization, which created a new revenue stream for The Globe.
Results
We launched on schedule with no disruption to existing advisors. Onboarding got faster, advisors could manage their own profiles, and The Globe gained a monetized consumer search product on a system built to grow.
The Task: To support a data migration project
The Client: The Globe and Mail
My Role: Product Designer
Skills involved: user research, product design, service mapping, systems design, automation mapping, interaction design, prototyping, wireframing.
Tools: Figma, Miro
Timeline: 8 months for major release - ongoing iterations and improvements
New advisor sign-ups in the first two weeks.
1000
Of existing advisors opted into the relaunched service
70%+
Paid-tier revenue stream from Find an Advisor
New
A workflow redesign that became a platform rebuild
The Globe wanted to connect financial advisors with new clients through a consumer search tool called Find an Advisor. It started as a workflow design project. It quickly grew into choosing a new platform, rebuilding onboarding and redesigning how advisor data moved, with few internal developers.
A fixed launch date and thousands of active users
We had to launch Find an Advisor, migrate thousands of advisor records and reroute the data pipelines behind them, all without disrupting service for advisors already on the platform.
involve advisors in usability testing earlier, so that there could be more customization in the experience, rather than rushing to build a viable MVP.
Do research earlier and in tandem with business so that they could inform their assumptions and expectations with both the product as well as the development.
Have better scoping of requirements. There were many unknowns that could've been better mitigated at the beginning. My scope increased because the project was underestimated from the beginning.
What i'd do differently:
Who owned what
I led
Onboarding flow and branching logic
Advisor dashboard design
User research
Onboarding flow and branching logic
I partnered
Find an Advisor tiers and naming
Service and automation mapping, with data and engineering
Vendor evaluation and selection, with the PM
The team owned
Vendor configuration and QA
Launch operations
Pipeline and migration engineering
Months of engineering
Heavy, with few developers
Build routing and approvals
Custom scripts & pipelines
Full control
Custom build
Launch within the deadline
Light, mostly configuration
Built in automations
Import tools and vendor support
Limited to what it allows
Vendor platform
Chosen
Criteria
Engineering effort
Workflow automation
Data migration
Long term flexibility
Time to launch
Chosen
Limited internal developers and fix launch date shaped the choice
Chose a builder platform vs a developer heavy build
With few internal developers and a fixed launch date, building custom wasn't realistic. We compared 10 vendors on workflow automation, user friendliness, adaptive to legacy systems and compliance with security criteria. We picked one that made it simple to create built-in automations covering most of what advisors needed, so design effort went into the experience, not the plumbing.
A dashboard advisors could manage themselves
Advisors needed to have their credentials verified by support in order to update their details. While onboarding solves this issue, I designed a new dashboard where they could edit their profile and business information, manage what clients see and edit any of their information on their own. Ultimately, it gives advisors freedom to make changes while cutting the support load for internal teams.
Shorter onboarding for new and returning advisors
The old onboarding relied on long, dated forms that people abandoned. The new flow:
Breaks sign-up into short guided steps
Uses branching logic to send new and returning advisors down the right path
Works on desktop and mobile
It also reduced errors and manual profile fixes for internal teams.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
A dashboard advisors could manage themselves
Behind the screens, I mapped how advisor data needed to move so engineering could reroute the pipelines and migrate thousands of records without downtime.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
ENTRY POINTS
LANDING
STANDARD LOGIN — APPLY
NOT INTERESTED PATH
LOGIN SUPPRESSED PATH
OUTCOME
Not Interested
Email Blast
GA Regwall
Opt-in Gate
Globe Account
Page
Advisor
Landing Page
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Not Interested
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Firm Type+Role
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Confirmation
Profile Submitted
Homepage
Return URL
Article Page
END
Not Interested
Login Suppressed (Existing User)
Shared
Standard Login (Apply)
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
Find an Advisor: a new product and revenue stream
The rebuilt system powered Find an Advisor, a consumer search tool for finding advisors nearby. Advisors could pay for higher tiers with more visibility and customization, which created a new revenue stream for The Globe.
Consumers
Financial advisors
People
Experiences
Find an advisor search
Onboarding & dashboard
Admin & review
Platform
Backrooms
Location, compare profiles
Branching sign up, self serve profile
Looking for an advisor nearby
New & returning
The Globe teams
Sales, support, editorial
Approve profiles, manage tiers
Advisor records
One source of truth
Workflow automations
One source of truth
Paid tiers
Visibility and customization
Rerouted data pipelines
SSO, Globe Advisor, Find an Advisor
Migrated advisor records
Thousands with zero downtime
We launched on schedule with no disruption to existing advisors. Onboarding got faster, advisors could manage their own profiles, and The Globe gained a monetized consumer search product on a system built to grow.
Results
New advisor sign-ups in the first two weeks.
1000
Of existing advisors opted into the relaunched service
70%+
New
Paid-tier revenue stream from Find an Advisor
involve advisors in usability testing earlier, so that there could be more customization in the experience, rather than rushing to build a viable MVP.
Do research earlier and in tandem with business so that they could inform their assumptions and expectations with both the product as well as the development.
Have better scoping of requirements. There were many unknowns that could've been better mitigated at the beginning. My scope increased because the project was underestimated from the beginning.
What i'd do differently:
The Task: Supporting a data migration strategy by finding a new platform to host customer data for financial advisors building workflows, onboarding forms and dashboards that support a new customer facing experience.
The Task: To support a data migration project
The Client: The Globe and Mail
My Role: Product Designer
Skills involved: user research, product design, service mapping, systems design, automation mapping, interaction design, prototyping, wireframing.
Tools: Figma, Miro
Timeline: 8 months for major release - ongoing iterations and improvements
A workflow redesign that became a platform rebuild
The Globe wanted to connect financial advisors with new clients through a consumer search tool called Find an Advisor. It started as a workflow design project, however, It quickly grew into choosing a new platform, rebuilding onboarding and redesigning how advisor data moved, with few internal developers.
The Globe wanted to connect financial advisors with new clients through a consumer search tool called Find an Advisor. It started as a workflow design project, however, It quickly grew into choosing a new platform, rebuilding onboarding and redesigning how advisor data moved, with few internal developers.
A fixed launch date and thousands of active users
We had to launch Find an Advisor, migrate thousands of advisor records and reroute the data pipelines behind them, all without disrupting service for advisors already on the platform.
We had to launch Find an Advisor, migrate thousands of advisor records and reroute the data pipelines behind them, all without disrupting service for advisors already on the platform.
Who owned what:
I led
Advisor dashboard design
User research
Onboarding flow and branching logic
I partnered
Find an Advisor tiers and naming
Service and automation mapping, with data and engineering
Vendor evaluation and selection, with the PM
The team owned
Vendor configuration and QA
Launch operations
Pipeline and migration engineering
The decision that shaped the build
Why a platform over a custom build
Limited internal developers and fix launch date shaped the choice
Criteria
Months of engineering
Months of engineering
Engineering effort
Engineering effort
Workflow automation
Workflow automation
Data migration
Data migration
Long term flexibility
Long term flexibility
Heavy, with few developers
Time to launch
Time to launch
Build routing and approvals
Custom scripts & pipelines
Full control
Full control
Launch within the deadline
Light, mostly configuration
Built in automations
Import tools and vendor support
Import tools and vendor support
Limited to what it allows
Custom build
Vendor platform
Chosen
Limited internal developers and fix launch date shaped the choice
Chose a builder platform vs a developer heavy build
With few internal developers and a fixed launch date, building custom wasn't realistic. We compared 10 vendors on workflow automation, user friendliness, adaptive to legacy systems and compliance with security criteria. We picked one that made it simple to create built-in automations covering most of what advisors needed, so design effort went into the experience, not the plumbing.
With few internal developers and a fixed launch date, building custom wasn't realistic. We compared 10 vendors on workflow automation, user friendliness, adaptive to legacy systems and compliance with security criteria. We picked one that made it simple to create built-in automations covering most of what advisors needed, so design effort went into the experience, not the plumbing.
Shorter onboarding for new and returning advisors
The old onboarding relied on long, dated forms that people abandoned. The new flow:
Breaks sign-up into short guided steps
Uses branching logic to send new and returning advisors down the right path
Works on desktop and mobile
It also reduced errors and manual profile fixes for internal teams.
The old onboarding relied on long, dated forms that people abandoned. The new flow:
Breaks sign-up into short guided steps
Uses branching logic to send new and returning advisors down the right path
Works on desktop and mobile
It also reduced errors and manual profile fixes for internal teams.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
ENTRY POINTS
LANDING
STANDARD LOGIN — APPLY
NOT INTERESTED PATH
LOGIN SUPPRESSED PATH
OUTCOME
Not Interested
Email Blast
GA Regwall
Opt-in Gate
Globe Account
Page
Advisor
Landing Page
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Not Interested
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Firm Type+Role
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Step 1
Join Directory
Step 2
Profile
Step 3
Professional
Step 4
Your Business
Step 5
Comms
Step 6
T&C
Confirmation
Profile Submitted
Homepage
Return URL
Article Page
END
Not Interested
Login Suppressed (Existing User)
Shared
Standard Login (Apply)
A dashboard advisors could manage themselves
Advisors needed to have their credentials verified by support in order to update their details. While onboarding solves this issue, I designed a new dashboard where they could edit their profile and business information, manage what clients see and edit any of their information on their own. Ultimately, it gives advisors freedom to make changes while cutting the support load for internal teams.
Advisors needed to have their credentials verified by support in order to update their details. While onboarding solves this issue, I designed a new dashboard where they could edit their profile and business information, manage what clients see and edit any of their information on their own. Ultimately, it gives advisors freedom to make changes while cutting the support load for internal teams.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
Rebuilding the data flows behind it
Behind the screens, I mapped how advisor data needed to move so engineering could reroute the pipelines and migrate thousands of records without downtime.
Behind the screens, I mapped how advisor data needed to move so engineering could reroute the pipelines and migrate thousands of records without downtime.
Consumers
Financial advisors
The Globe teams
People
Experiences
Find an advisor
search
Onboarding & dashboard
Admin & review
Platform
Backrooms
The new core
Advisor records
One source of truth
One source of truth
Workflow automations
Routing, reminders
Routing, reminders
Workflow automations
Paid tiers
Routing, reminders
Visibility and customization
Rerouted data pipelines
SSO, Globe Advisor, Find an advisor
SSO, Globe Advisor, Find an advisor
Migrated advisor records
Thousands with zero downtime
Thousands with zero downtime
Location, compare profiles
Branching sign up, self serve profile
Approve profiles, manage tiers
Looking for an advisor nearby
New & returning
Sales, support, editorial
Find an Advisor: a new product and revenue stream
The rebuilt system powered Find an Advisor, a consumer search tool for finding advisors nearby. Advisors could pay for higher tiers with more visibility and customization, which created a new revenue stream for The Globe.
The rebuilt system powered Find an Advisor, a consumer search tool for finding advisors nearby. Advisors could pay for higher tiers with more visibility and customization, which created a new revenue stream for The Globe.
Q1 2019
18-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
Results
Results
New advisor sign-ups in the first
two weeks.
New advisor sign-ups in the first two weeks.
1000
Of existing advisors opted into the relaunched service
Of existing advisors opted into the relaunched service
70%+
70%+
paid-tier revenue stream from Find an Advisor
Paid-tier revenue stream from Find an Advisor
New
New
We launched on schedule with no disruption to existing advisors. Onboarding got faster, advisors could manage their own profiles, and The Globe gained a monetized consumer search product on a system built to grow.
What i'd do differently:
involve advisors in usability testing earlier, so that there could be more customization in the experience, rather than rushing to build a viable MVP.
Do research earlier and in tandem with business so that they could inform their assumptions and expectations with both the product as well as the development.
Have better scoping of requirements. There were many unknowns that could've been better mitigated at the beginning. My scope increased because the project was underestimated from the beginning.
What i'd do differently:
involve advisors in usability testing earlier, so that there could be more customization in the experience, rather than rushing to build a viable MVP.
Do research earlier and in tandem with business so that they could inform their assumptions and expectations with both the product as well as the development.
Have better scoping of requirements. There were many unknowns that could've been better mitigated at the beginning. My scope increased because the project was underestimated from the beginning.
A workflow redesign that became a platform rebuild
The Globe wanted to connect financial advisors with new clients through a consumer search tool called Find an Advisor. It started as a workflow design project. It quickly grew into choosing a new platform, rebuilding onboarding and redesigning how advisor data moved, with few internal developers.