Honest Credit Card: Growth Enhancement Through Acquisition
Honest is a fintech company offering simple, transparent credit cards for Indonesians. As Growth Design Lead, I partnered with seven cross-functional squads to improve the end-to-end application and onboarding experience. Targeted enhancements to the KYC flow and early application stages led to a 5% uplift in KYC submissions in Q3 2024, unlocking an estimated $2.5 million in additional revenue.
Credit card Mobile Application
Honest Technologies
Q3 2024 - Q2 2025
Growth Design Lead
Challenge
In Q4 2023, while most users progressed through mobile verification, we saw a sharp 33% drop at KYC submission. This meant one in three potential customers left before verifying their identity, making it our most critical funnel issue to solve.
Results
We identified key friction points in the KYC journey and made changes across the user interface and backend process. As a result, we achieved a 5% lift in KYC completion in Q3 2024, unlocking an estimated $2.5M in additional revenue.
↑ 10%
Improved onboarding process
↑ 5%
Increase in submission rate
↑ $2.5M
Increase in additional revenue
Process
I led the drop-off investigation by applying multiple user research methods to gather robust insights and collaborating closely with stakeholders to define OKRs and select KPIs.
Research & Analysis: We conducted user interviews, gathering feedback and complaints through the Customer Care team, and analyzed in-app analytics to understand the pain points and user needs. We also studied competitor apps and industry trends to gather insights
Wireframing & Prototyping: We redesigned the onboarding flow and built interactive prototype to test the design.
Usability Testing: We conducted usability tests with 7 participants to validate the design and identify areas for improvement. Based on the feedback, we made necessary adjustments to the design.
Conduct A/B testing: We iterate the designs after gathering feedback from the usability test and set up the A/B testing to validate new design proposal. We use the result to make the decision whether we release new design or not.
KYC detailed funnel during Q4 of 2023
After identifying drop-off points, we conducted user interviews with the end users who dropped off at these three particular points.
5 users who dropped off at the KTP form were interviewed.
Findings:
3 participants experienced technical issues, such as failures with the KTP form, face biometrics, or signal problems.
2 participants continued with the process and didn’t get approved from Honest Card.
Other Insights
Objective Customer care report:
Users failed identity verification due to mismatches between their real-life appearance and the photo on their KTP.
Objective usability test:
5 users completed applications successfully
1 user had saved his KTP photo on another phone and scanned it using the phone he used to apply
1 user had lost his KTP and brought a B/W printout, which failed the verification
These insights made us certain about the next approach. We propose the OKR and prepare for the new design solutions.
Proposed OKR for Q3 2024
Objective: Increase the number of completed credit card application submissions
Key result:
Increase KYC submission rate by 8% to boost the application submission rate in 1 quarter to convert more prospects into active Honest customers and drive growth so we can meet our life time value revenue of $27M
Reduce the application time from 6 minutes to 4 minutes to lower friction and prevent users from dropping off mid-process.
Reduce KYC submission-related customer care tickets by 30% to improve onboarding clarity and decrease support workload.
Signals:
Higher application completion rate in analytics
Faster average time to complete key steps
Lower volume of application flow support tickets
Increased successful KYC upload rate
Higher usability scores from testing
Feature proposal:
App introduction onboarding
Problem statement: User interviews revealed that 5 out of 15 participants dropped off during the KYC flow because they were uncertain whether they actually needed a credit card and felt they lacked enough information to proceed confidently. This uncertainty caused hesitation and abandonment early in the process.
Feature description: Provide a short onboarding introduction that clearly explains what Honest Card is and the key benefits, helping users understand the value of the service before they enter the application and KYC flow.
Success criteria:
Increase KYC submission rate from 67% → 75%
Increase application submission rate from 48% → 58%
Reduce application time from 6 minutes → 4 minutes
Result: We added app introduction onboarding and a language switcher, then launched an A/B test experiment. While the variation did not result in a significant win, we proceeded with the change as the onboarding flow improved the overall user experience.
Feature proposal:
WhatsApp reminder campaign
Problem statement: From user interviews, 5 out of 15 participants dropped off during the KYC flow because they were distracted by other tasks. Of these, 4 later returned to continue the process, while another forgot entirely. Behavioral data also showed that many users who stop the flow uninstall the app after 24 hours. This indicates that distraction and forgetfulness are major contributors to drop-off.
Feature description: Send WhatsApp reminders to users who drop off, first after 15 minutes and again after 24 hours. These reminders should prompt users to continue their application and provide a way to contact customer support if they are still uncertain.
Success criteria:
10% of users who receive a reminder return to continue the application
Increase KYC submission rate from 67% → 75%
Increase application submission rate from 48% → 58%
Reduce application time from 6 minutes → 4 minutes
Other solutions
During user interviews, some users gained a clearer understanding of the product and decided to submit an application. As a result, we assigned several customer care agents to contact users who dropped off during the application process to provide support in case they had doubts about the product. However, only 38% of the contacted users answered the call, and just 4% of them proceeded to complete and submit the application successfully.
We also sent follow-up emails to users who dropped off the application process, but only 0.02% opened the emails. Consequently, we discontinued both of these solutions.
Conclusion
This project demonstrated how focused UX improvements, grounded in both quantitative and qualitative insights, can unlock meaningful business impact. By combining funnel analytics, drop-off data, customer care reports, usability testing, and user interviews, we identified the KYC stage as the primary source of friction. Addressing these issues through clearer guidance, improved interactions, and coordinated backend changes led to a 5 percent increase in KYC completion in Q3 2024, unlocking an estimated $2.5 million in additional revenue.
Beyond the metrics, this case reinforced my approach as a design lead: triangulating data to inform decisions, aligning teams around clear OKRs, and validating solutions through experimentation. By balancing user needs with business constraints and compliance requirements, we delivered improvements that scaled across teams and established a stronger foundation for future acquisition and onboarding optimisations.
