2020
USAA
Personalizing Member Experiences with Data-Driven Insights
Overview
USAA, a Fortune 100 financial services company, has served over 13 million military members and their families since its founding in 1922. Known for its customer-first approach, USAA provides a wide range of products, including insurance, banking, investments, and retirement services, tailored specifically to the unique needs of its members.
As part of the Enterprise Personalization team, I led the Next Best Action initiative—a strategic effort to transform member interactions by delivering personalized, timely, and relevant experiences. This initiative aimed to bridge the gap between USAA's various digital and in-person platforms, creating a cohesive, empathetic experience aligned with members' financial goals. My role as Lead Experience Designer focused on designing and implementing solutions that balanced business objectives with the needs of USAA's diverse member base. The project ultimately redefined how the organization engaged with its members, driving measurable business results and improved user satisfaction.
MY ROLE
Design lead
MY SKILLS
Research
Workshop & Facilitation
Conceptualization
Visual Design
Interaction Design
The Challenge
USAA’s members faced fragmented interactions across digital platforms, which resulted in overwhelming options and conflicting messaging. This lack of cohesion not only created confusion but also hindered members from making informed decisions about their financial well-being. The challenge was to streamline these experiences by aligning organizational goals and ensuring interactions were personalized, relevant, and impactful.
The Approach
To address this, I facilitated collaborative workshops with business partners and product owners across USAA’s key lines of business to align on problem statements and identify priority use cases. These sessions helped uncover the core challenges and opportunities in the existing ecosystem.
Building on this foundation, I worked closely with the research team to develop personas that reflected the diverse needs of USAA’s member base. We created "To-Be" journey maps to visualize ideal experiences and used them to validate proposed solutions. These artifacts became key tools for engaging stakeholders, ensuring alignment across teams, and driving design decisions that centered on empathy and member needs.
The Result
The Next Best Action initiative resulted in organizational alignment around a shared strategy for personalizing member interactions. Implementing this approach streamlined decision-making processes for members, delivering relevant and empathetic recommendations that aligned with their financial goals. This transformation not only improved user engagement but also reinforced USAA's reputation for exceptional member service, showcasing the value of design-driven solutions in a complex, member-focused industry.
This case study highlights how strategic design can drive meaningful change in member experiences while addressing organizational challenges, ultimately delivering results that align with both user and business needs.
