The Fintech Effect 2022
Plaid
Report
Whitepaper
Role
Lead designer
Team
Design Marketing: Amy W.
Illustration: Agnes L.
Project Management: Gillian M.
Policy & Technology: Ben W.
Copywriting: Gwen T.
Plaid Inc. is a financial technology company that provides a platform, using APIs (Application Programming Interfaces), to connect consumer bank accounts with financial apps, like Venmo and Chime.
Annually, for the past three years, Plaid and Harris Poll develop a consumer survey report that presents findings and insights in relation to the current climate around finance and fintech.
Challenge
Deliver:
50-page main report
3 mini-reports
Gated landing page
Blog post
Social and media advertising
Design a visual theme that related to the overall themes and data collected, while written analysis overlapped creative work.
Stretch the report design, format, and layout from the base brand design styles. And a personal goal of exploring interactivity within the report, along with a more online friendly medium for presentation and distribution.
Process
The design team chose a Rube Goldberg theme to playfully illustrate how technology affects consumer financial behaviors. We introduced hand-drawn markup elements to highlight the report's editorial nature.
I designed the main report in InDesign, opting for a landscape orientation to better suit digital viewing on desktops and laptops, while still allowing for print if needed.
Although there weren’t many interactive report examples to draw from, I researched available tools and formats, though they ultimately didn't fit within the project budget.
I collaborated with the copywriter to develop the landing page, assisting with content management system details and available components.
I also provided guidance to an external agency on using the design file for creating mini-reports.
Selection of pages from the main report
Mini-report covers
Social ads
Landing page (scroll image for full page)
Blog post (scroll image for full page)
Outcome
Although the deliverable list fluctuated during the project and the technical assistance from design exceeded what was initially requested; the launch of the report was a success:
1,509 main report downloads 2 weeks after launch
306 MQLs
$32K annual contract value pipeline
41 mentions, 37 reshare socials
Even though the interactivity features I had looked into, ultimately did not make it to the final cut of the project; the exploration was an interesting dive.