Amber Sharma

Sr. product Designer

home

About

Amber Sharma

Sr. product Designer

home

About

smallcase

2024

HMW help investors seamlessly track & manage all smallcase subscriptions?

Responsibility

Lead product designer

and core UX architecture

Team

3 Designers, 2 Product Managers,
12+ Engineers

Time

Mar - April, 2024

Problem

As smallcase scaled, investors subscribed to multiple smallcase through different advisors without a unified way to view, manage, or exit them

Control was fragmented across advisor microsites and inboxes, creating anxiety and accidental renewals. Users lacked a reliable system to track and manage ongoing commitments

Design outcome

We shifted subscription management from advisor-owned flows to a unified platform system, giving users a single, reliable surface for all subscriptions

Within six months, subscription management reached

300k

adoption for subscription management within 6 months

24%

uplift in annual fixed revenue

65%

reduced subscription-related tickets

Why this problem mattered

Subscriptions are a core monetization lever for smallcase and the backbone of the advisor ecosystem.

While investing journeys were mature, subscription management remained opaque, fragmented, and support-dependent, creating three systemic risks

Subscriptions were effectively advisor-owned flows. Fixing this meant redesigning the system, not polishing individual screens.

User trust risk: accidental renewals and unclear cancellations
Revenue risk: churn driven by frustration, not intent
Operational risk: high support dependency for basic billing needs

What users were struggling with

I interviewed 50+ active subscribers (single- and multi-manager) to understand behavioral and emotional friction, not just surface usability issues

🤨

Users had no single source of truth.

💸

Cancellations were easy to forget and expensive to miss

🧾

Invoices were buried in inboxes or locked behind support tickets

Core insight

The system worked only when nothing went wrong, an unacceptable assumption in a financial product.

User trust risk due to accidental renewals and unclear cancellations

Revenue risk churn driven by frustration, not intent

Operational risk as high support dependency for basic billing needs

Defining the problem

HMW help users seamlessly track and manage all smallcase subscriptions at one place?

Design goals

The goal was to make subscriptions controllable, and trustworthy across their full lifecycle

We optimized for

Clear ownership of all subscriptions, active or inactive
Predictable billing and renewal behaviour
Reduced dependency on support through clarity by design
Billing records were scattered across emails

Trade-offs

Less advisor level flexibility to gain platform trust
Building shared infrastructure increased upfront engineering cost, but simplified future monetization features
Making cancellation easier risked short-term revenue loss, but reduced accidental churn and support-driven dissatisfaction

Design Highlights

Each change addressed a failure in ownership, predictability, or accountability across the subscription lifecycle

Design goal : Flexible

Unified subscription dashboard

Problem

Subscriptions were fragmented across advisor microsites, forcing users to remember where control lived and making oversight fragile

Solution

A single, user-owned source of truth for all subscriptions—shifting ownership from advisors to the platform and restoring control.

Design goal : Flexible

Unified subscription dashboard

Problem

Subscriptions were fragmented across advisor microsites, forcing users to remember where control lived and making oversight fragile

Solution

A single, user-owned source of truth for all subscriptions—shifting ownership from advisors to the platform and restoring control.

Design goal : Flexible

Unified subscription dashboard

Problem

Subscriptions were fragmented across advisor microsites, forcing users to remember where control lived and making oversight fragile

Solution

A single, user-owned source of truth for all subscriptions—shifting ownership from advisors to the platform and restoring control.

Design goal : Flexible

Helpful Subscription Cards

Problem

Absence of crucial notifications leads users to forget payment or renewal dates, resulting in missed deadlines or unintented payments

Solution

Early, explicit renewal signals that made continuation a conscious choice, not an accident

Design goal : Flexible

Helpful Subscription Cards

Problem

Absence of crucial notifications leads users to forget payment or renewal dates, resulting in missed deadlines or unintented payments

Solution

Early, explicit renewal signals that made continuation a conscious choice, not an accident

Design goal : Flexible

Helpful Subscription Cards

Problem

Absence of crucial notifications leads users to forget payment or renewal dates, resulting in missed deadlines or unintented payments

Solution

Early, explicit renewal signals that made continuation a conscious choice, not an accident

Design goal : Actionable

Financial traceability as a first-class capability

Problem

Scattered invoices made it hard for users to verify past payments, weakening confidence in billing accuracy

Solution

A single, always-available record of past and upcoming charges—removing reliance on support for financial clarity

Design goal : Actionable

Financial traceability as a first-class capability

Problem

Scattered invoices made it hard for users to verify past payments, weakening confidence in billing accuracy

Solution

A single, always-available record of past and upcoming charges—removing reliance on support for financial clarity

Design goal : Actionable

Financial traceability as a first-class capability

Problem

Scattered invoices made it hard for users to verify past payments, weakening confidence in billing accuracy

Solution

A single, always-available record of past and upcoming charges—removing reliance on support for financial clarity

Design goal : Actionable

Designing the exit as a first-class system behavior

Problem

Unclear cancellation outcomes made exits feel risky, discouraging trust and pushing users to support

Solution

A predictable exit model that clearly separated access, billing, and investments, making leaving safe and explicit

Design goal : Actionable

Designing the exit as a first-class system behavior

Problem

Unclear cancellation outcomes made exits feel risky, discouraging trust and pushing users to support

Solution

A predictable exit model that clearly separated access, billing, and investments, making leaving safe and explicit

Design goal : Actionable

Designing the exit as a first-class system behavior

Problem

Unclear cancellation outcomes made exits feel risky, discouraging trust and pushing users to support

Solution

A predictable exit model that clearly separated access, billing, and investments, making leaving safe and explicit

Design goal : Flexible

Closing the loop on subscription exits

Problem

Cancellation reasons were invisible, leaving churn drivers unclear and decisions intuition-led

Solution

Structured exit feedback captured at the moment of cancellation to inform product, pricing, and advisor quality

Design goal : Flexible

Closing the loop on subscription exits

Problem

Cancellation reasons were invisible, leaving churn drivers unclear and decisions intuition-led

Solution

Structured exit feedback captured at the moment of cancellation to inform product, pricing, and advisor quality

Design goal : Flexible

Closing the loop on subscription exits

Problem

Cancellation reasons were invisible, leaving churn drivers unclear and decisions intuition-led

Solution

Structured exit feedback captured at the moment of cancellation to inform product, pricing, and advisor quality

Reflections

This project reshaped how I think about monetization UX

Subscription systems are trust systems. By shifting ownership to users, we reduced support, improved renewal confidence, and set a precedent for future paid features.