Leads Direct
Self Service Lead Buying Platform
A scalable self-service experience that enabled smaller insurance accounts to access lead purchasing without requiring hands-on support from internal teams.
Overview
The Problem
Insurance account managers were stretched thin supporting high-touch lead purchasing workflows, making it difficult to effectively serve smaller businesses and independent agents. While these customers represented valuable revenue opportunities, the manual onboarding and purchasing process was not scalable and required significant internal support.
The Solution
A lead buying platform that allowed insurance agents and small businesses to independently purchase and manage leads online, reducing operational overhead and improving scalability.
Skills
Tools
My Role
I was worked on this project for the entire end to end process. I conducted user research to understand the needs and pain points of small business owners and independent agents. I created proto-personas, user flows, and wireframes to map out the experience. I also designed the full UI, ensuring it was intuitive and on-brand. Throughout the project, I presented key milestones to stakeholders and worked closely with developers during implementation and QA.
Product Overview
A centralized lead management platform that allowed users to configure campaign preferences, automate lead delivery, and track lead engagement through a streamlined self-service experience.
The Dashboard
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View new leads and manage statuses
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Highlighted user-selected targeting criteria directly within lead cards for quick validation that campaign preferences were being met
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View real-time lead delivery and spend metrics
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Enabled users to quickly view and access campaign settings
Campaign Set Up
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Allowed users to configure lead delivery preferences and scheduling
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Supported customizable campaign rules based on budget and lead capacity
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Simplified complex targeting workflows into a guided self-service experience
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Provided transparent cost visibility and delivery controls
Lead Table
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Organized leads into a manageable, searchable workflow
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Enabled users to view, sort by and update lead statuses throughout the sales process
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Indicates and prioritizes new leads
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Designed for quick scanning and high-volume lead processing
Research & Discovery
The idea for Leads Direct originated from conversations between the VP of our insurance vertical and independent agents at industry conventions. Many smaller agencies expressed interest in purchasing leads from us, but our internal account management team lacked the bandwidth to support smaller accounts through our traditionally high-touch sales process.
After reviewing competitor self-service platforms and identifying opportunities to improve the experience, our team aligned on creating a scalable solution that would allow smaller agencies to independently manage lead purchasing online. My role began with understanding who these users were, what challenges they faced, and what they would need from a self-service lead management platform.
Proto Persona
To better understand the needs of smaller insurance agencies and independent agents, I developed proto personas based on stakeholder insights, competitor analysis, and existing lead purchasing workflows. This research helped identify the pain points, motivations, and expectations users would have when using a self-service platform.
Key Findings
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Needed a fast and intuitive way to configure lead delivery without relying on account managers
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Wants high quality leads over abundance of leads
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Often managed leads independently while balancing day-to-day business operations
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Needs to be able to set precise filters
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Journey Map
I created a journey map to contextualize the insights uncovered during the proto-persona phase and apply them to a realistic end-to-end user experience. Mapping the user journey helped transform abstract user needs into tangible workflows, allowing me to better identify friction points, moments of uncertainty, and opportunities for automation within the lead purchasing process.
This storytelling approach also became a valuable communication tool when collaborating with stakeholders and the tech team, helping align feature prioritization and justify key product decisions throughout development.
Key Findings
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Users needed to trust the quality and reliability of the leads before investing in a campaign
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Clear pricing and upfront cost visibility were important for smaller agencies managing tighter budgets
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Since users were often multitasking throughout the day, the experience needed to feel fast, intuitive, and well organized to easily manage leads
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Users wanted greater control over when and how leads were delivered to align with their business capacity
Planning & Red Route
After defining user needs and pain points, I shifted into planning the core product structure and critical workflows. Because the platform introduced a new self-service model for the business, it was important to first define the scope of the experience, identify required functionality, and prioritize the key user actions necessary for a successful lead management workflow.
Site mapping and red route planning were developed in parallel, helping align user needs, business goals, and technical requirements early in the process.
Site Map (Design Plan)
I used early site mapping exercises to define the scope of the platform, identify required pages and functionality, and uncover open product questions that needed stakeholder alignment before moving into detailed workflows.
Red Route
Once the platform structure was established, I mapped the red route flow to prioritize the most critical user actions required for successful lead purchasing and management. This exercise helped simplify complex workflows while ensuring the experience supported both user goals and business requirements.
Flow Iterations
As business and technical requirements evolved, the red route flow was iterated to support changes in how users added and managed campaign funds. After discussions with the financial and engineering teams, it was determined that campaign spending would need to function through a daily invoicing model rather than rolling account funds. Revisiting these workflows early helped reduce implementation complexity and ensured the final experience remained intuitive despite shifting requirements.
Implementation & QA
As the platform moved into development, I created detailed implementation flows to support collaboration with the engineering team and ensure complex workflows were clearly documented beyond the interactive prototypes.
These flows helped communicate user decisions, navigation states, backend interactions, and API-dependent moments within the experience, reducing ambiguity during implementation and improving cross-functional alignment throughout development.
Developer Handoff: Sign Up Flow
This flow documentation mapped the complete account creation experience, including authentication paths, verification states, profile setup, and backend account creation processes. By combining annotated UI references with user decisions and system actions, the flow helped streamline developer implementation and reduce ambiguity across a multi-step onboarding experience.
Developer Handoff: Campaign & Payment
This flow documented the end-to-end campaign setup and payment process, outlining user inputs, conditional states, API interactions, and success/error scenarios. Including both frontend interactions and backend dependencies helped the development team clearly understand complex implementation logic without relying solely on interactive prototypes.
QA
Following implementation, I conducted QA reviews in Jira to ensure the final product aligned with the intended user experience and interaction patterns established during the design phase. This included validating responsive behavior, reviewing edge cases, identifying UI inconsistencies, and collaborating closely with developers and other QA team members to resolve usability and functionality issues before launch.
Sketches & Prototyping
Early sketching and prototyping helped rapidly explore workflow structures, navigation patterns, and campaign management interactions before moving into high-fidelity designs. As the platform evolved, interactive prototypes became an important tool for validating flows, communicating behavior to stakeholders, and supporting developer implementation across both primary and secondary user experiences.
Initial Sketch (Dashboard)
Initial dashboard exploration based on an early rolling-funds payment model.
Iterative Sketch (Dashboard)
Dashboard iteration reflecting initial stakeholder feedback and campaign management requirements.
Final Iteration
Key Features
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Key focus is to get users to create campaign
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Include many clear CTA
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Give skeleton views of whats to come
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Entice users with playful illustrations
Prototypes
New Users
This prototype explored the first-time user experience, guiding users through the onboarding version of the dashboard experience into payment setup and campaign creation. Because campaign funding and billing transparency were critical business requirements, the flow included multiple moments reinforcing pricing expectations, payment timing, and campaign behavior before launch.
To create a more guided and engaging experience, I also designed custom icons, animated GIFs, and microinteractions that provided users with progress feedback, confirmations, and contextual support throughout the workflow.
Returning Users
This prototype focused on the returning user experience and the day-to-day management workflows users would interact with after campaign launch. The flow prioritized quick access to new leads, campaign visibility, lead management tools, and account-related functionality while supporting the fast-paced workflows of independent agents and small business owners.
User Testing
To validate the usability of the platform before launch, I advocated for a round of blind user testing. While stakeholders initially wanted all potential testers to be introduced to the platform beforehand, I recommended reserving a group of users who had never previously seen the product in order to better simulate a real first-time user experience. I created a user testing plan outlining participant criteria, testing goals, and task flows, which was later approved by stakeholders for internal testing.
In addition to blind usability testing, the product also underwent multiple rounds of internal scenario-based testing focused on identifying bugs, edge cases, workflow failures, and support documentation gaps prior to launch.
User Testing Plan
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Goals
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Assess the intuitiveness of the interface and user flows
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Identify points of confusion
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Understand user expectations. Does the UI align with potential user mental models?
Key Findings
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Overall users found UI to be intuitive and were successfully able to complete all 3 tasks
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User expectations were aligned/clear:
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How many leads they would be receiving
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Cost per lead
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When they would be receiving leads
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When their card is being charged
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​Users had difficulty locating Order History
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There were some inaccuracies in the FAQ we need to address
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Users will need the ability to create more then one campaign or select more then one campaign type in the future (out of scope)
Landing Page & Launch Prep
As the product moved closer to launch, ownership of the marketing landing page was transitioned to me in collaboration with the marketing team. Early discussions focused on creating a more approachable and hand-crafted visual style inspired by competitor research and stakeholder references. As the product vision evolved, the direction later shifted toward a cleaner, more technology-focused aesthetic that better aligned with the platform’s SaaS experience and business goals.
Initial Hero Design
Key Points
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Explored hand-drawn and illustrated visual concepts
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Kept design clean and fresh for a approachable feel for small business' & agents
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Focused on simplifying complex lead purchasing concepts
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Prioritized clear onboarding and educational messaging
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Emphasized multiple points of action to get started or sign up
Iteration & Final Direction
Key Points
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Shifted visual direction to better align with the SaaS product experience
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Introduced a video-based hero section to grab user attention and give a more high tech feel
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Focused messaging around what the platform is, how it works, and its core value proposition
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Maintained a clean, modern, and approachable first impression
Launch Preperation
Following development and testing, the platform was successfully prepared for production release and presented to stakeholders and leadership teams across multiple business verticals. Early discussions also explored opportunities to expand the self-service model into additional markets, including the home services vertical, demonstrating the scalability and long-term potential of the platform.