Pulse Voices
2026
Introducing the Inbox Approach: Redesigning How Participants Navigate Pulse Voices
The new mobile consumer experience led to increased invite acceptance and study applications per user.
Overview
A redesigned navigation around a single inbox model organizing every study, message, and notification in one place.
Pulse Labs was growing fast, constantly iterating to keep up with customer demands. Over time, multiple shifts in the platform structure left the Pulse Voices product feeling disjointed for participants, the people we recruit to deliver valuable insights back to our customers. The Design Director trusted me to help envision the future of the platform for the participants we recruit.
The Impact:
Navigation overhaul
Expanded project flow
Higher invite acceptance
More applications per user
Less time lost to participant confusion
Problem
Our participants needed (the right) support
Participants had to hunt across disconnected tabs and message types just to find and act on a study invite. When they ran into an issue, there was confusion on who to reach out to: our customer or our internal support. This confusion led to participants reaching out to our customers (the researchers) and our research managers for support.
Almost half of requests were related to using the app instead of support intended for the actual studies.
The challenge was handling the scale of the redesign while the product kept moving. Years of quickly shipping features to meet customer demand weakened the participant experience in each and every attempt to add more.
01 - Neglect for study support 02 - Messaging confusion 03 - Wrong app hierarchy
Research & Discovery
What We Already Knew
Analytics
Onboarding completion was low between account creation and first study invite accepted
Notification tap-through rates were low, suggesting participants weren't noticing or trusting in-app alerts
Existing user research
New users described onboarding as "long" even though most steps were required for compliance/eligibility
NPS data
NPS scores were lower among newer participants than long-tenured ones, pointing to a first-experience problem rather than a product-wide one
Open-ended NPS comments repeatedly mentioned confusion about notifications or "not knowing what's going on with my study"
Sales/support feedback
Support tickets clustered around "where do I find my study" and "why didn't I get notified"
Participant drop-off during onboarding was affecting study fill rates for customers
Participants were missing time-sensitive study invites and losing eligibility
What I Did to Learn More
Through interviews and workflow analysis, I identified recurring patterns in how users reviewed balances, tracked transactions, and navigated everyday financial tasks. The biggest issue wasn’t financial complexity itself — it was uncertainty. Users often stopped to compare balances, reopen transaction details, or rescan multiple sections before taking action. Similar visual weight across the interface made it difficult to quickly identify what mattered most.
Insights
Participants were struggling with finding studies more than they were struggling to do them. Support tickets clustering around "where do I find my study" and "why didn't I get notified" pointed to a navigation and visibility problem, not a content or usability problem within the studies themselves. [CORE SOLUTION]
Messaging had become a catch-all, negatively affecting our support team and our customers. Nearly half of all participant support requests were about using the app rather than the studies. This was a sign that invites, notifications, and researcher messages were competing for attention with no clear hierarchy of what needed action. [CORE SOLUTION]
Distrust in notifications was driving missed, time-sensitive opportunities. Low notification tap-through rates directly correlated with participants missing study invites and losing eligibility, creating a fill-rate issue for customers.
The problem wasn't isolated to new users, but it hit them hardest. Lower NPS among newer participants and feedback describing onboarding as "long" suggested the platform's rapid, feature-by-feature growth worsened the first-time experience, creating a lack of trust early into usage.
Competitors handled participant communication as a single, prioritized stream. Pulse Voices treated it as several disconnected ones. Competitive analysis reinforced that the fragmentation participants were experiencing was specific to how features had been added incrementally without a unifying structure.
Ideation
Exploring interface directions
Through interviews and workflow analysis, I identified recurring patterns in how users reviewed balances, tracked transactions, and navigated everyday financial tasks. The biggest issue wasn’t financial complexity itself — it was uncertainty. Users often stopped to compare balances, reopen transaction details, or rescan multiple sections before taking action. Similar visual weight across the interface made it difficult to quickly identify what mattered most.
Exploring different dashboard concepts focused on hierarchy, transaction visibility, and clearer everyday financial workflows.
Testing interaction flows early
Before moving into high-fidelity designs, I tested early interaction flows using low-fidelity paper prototypes. These quick sessions helped validate navigation patterns, layout hierarchy, and task completion behavior before investing time into polished UI design.
Designs
Refining the dashboard experience
The final redesign focused on improving clarity across everyday financial tasks through stronger hierarchy, simplified navigation, and more contextual transaction feedback. The updated interface made balances easier to compare, actions easier to locate, and activity flows easier to understand at a glance.
Overview of spending trends, category insights, and budget usage designed for faster financial scanning.
Instant card controls allowing users to freeze cards, manage limits, and update payment settings with minimal friction.
A simplified dashboard focused on balance visibility, transaction context, and clearer everyday financial workflows.
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