Hi, I’m Victoria! I’ve recently completed a four-year degree in Interaction Design (Digital Design). My university journey has been eye-opening, rewarding, and at times challenging, but through it I’ve grown in confidence as a designer, developed valuable skills, and built a strong foundation for the future ahead.
I completed my third-year placement at Aflac Northern Ireland, where I worked as part of the Agent Hub team as a UX/UI Designer. In this role, I collaborated closely with product owners and developers to design a new mobile and web application for Aflac agents, focusing on meeting user needs and solving real problems to make their day-to-day work more efficient. Throughout the placement, I conducted user testing, gathered valuable feedback, and developed a deeper understanding of user-centred design and how thoughtful digital experiences can improve usability.
My final year has been an incredibly valuable experience. I challenged myself to tackle a real-life problem that many young adults, including myself, face around financial understanding and confidence. This project gave me the creative freedom to showcase my skills as a designer, from research and problem-solving through to crafting a full digital experience prototype.
Econo is a gamified learning mobile application designed to improve users’ understanding of money and personal finance in an engaging, interactive, and accessible way. Through real-life scenarios, intuitive design, and playful learning experiences, Econo helps users build confidence in managing their finances while making complex financial topics easier to understand.
Econo presents users with an interactive city environment, filled with buildings that represent different areas of financial life. Locations such as the Home, Bank, Workplace, and Property Office guide users through immersive, real-life scenario-based learning experiences that reflect everyday financial situations and challenges. By transforming complex financial topics into interactive journeys, Econo makes learning about money more engaging, relatable, and easier to understand.
The story behind Econo is deeply personal to me. Growing up in a working-class background, I witnessed first-hand the challenges that can come with managing money and finances. In recent years, the rising cost of living and increasing house prices have made financial independence feel even more overwhelming, particularly for young adults like myself who may not know where to begin. Econo was born from a desire to create a supportive, accessible, and engaging way for people to build confidence in understanding their finances.
At school, I don’t remember ever being taught how to manage life beyond education — from opening a savings account and understanding bills, to navigating the process of buying a house. These are essential life skills, yet many young people are expected to figure them out independently. Econo aims to bridge that gap by providing financial education in an enjoyable, relatable, and accessible way through real-life scenario-based learning.
I began the development of Econo by gaining a clear understanding of the problem I wanted to solve. Financial education is often introduced too late, leaving many young adults to navigate important money-related decisions only when they are faced with them in real life. Without prior knowledge or guidance, this can lead to confusion, stress, and even embarrassment when managing finances independently. Existing financial information can also feel overwhelming and inaccessible. While platforms such as GOV.UK provide valuable information, it is often presented in long, jargon-heavy blocks of text that can feel intimidating, particularly for those with little to no prior financial knowledge. This highlighted an opportunity to reimagine financial education in a way that feels more engaging, approachable, and easier to understand.
Once I had a clear understanding of the problem, I began exploring Econo’s target market and competitor landscape. Direct competitors included financial platforms such as Monzo, MoneyHelper, and Moneybox, which help users better manage or understand their finances. As Econo takes a gamified approach, I also looked beyond the financial sector at platforms like The Sims and Duolingo, which create engaging, interactive experiences through play and progression. This helped shape Econo’s visual direction and user experience. Econo’s primary target market is 18–30-year-olds who are beginning to manage their own money and finances independently. However, I believe the platform could be valuable for anyone aged 16 and above. Through research, I discovered that many older adults also rely on partners or family members to manage their finances, highlighting an opportunity for Econo to support greater financial confidence and independence across a wider audience.
I developed and distributed a 10-question survey to gain insight into the financial knowledge, behaviours, and confidence levels of my target audience. Shared across my personal social media platforms and LinkedIn, the survey reached 30 respondents aged 18–30. The goal was to validate the assumptions formed in the early stages of the project and ensure the problems I was designing for were grounded in real user feedback.
The design process for Econo was iterative and evolved throughout the project. My original concept of interactive learning developed into a more focused scenario-based learning experience as the project progressed. To better understand Econo’s users, I created user personas, empathy maps, and user journey maps, alongside exploring user stress cases and the situations in which they may need support. Once I had a clear understanding of the user experience, I moved into structuring the app through affinity mapping, sitemaps, and finally developing the user flow.
After numerous sketches and wireframes, Econo evolved into a fully illustrative set of high-fidelity designs. The final outcome creates a stress-free, engaging approach to financial education, allowing users to learn through relatable real-life scenarios within a gamified environment. As this problem personally resonates with me, designing Econo has been especially meaningful. I wanted to create an experience where young adults feel empowered to learn, build confidence in managing their finances, and never feel undereducated or overwhelmed by the challenges of adult life.
