Government services are all too easily associated with roads, rubbish and healthcare, but our wellbeing and happiness goes beyond these simple metrics. In a bid to extend the support to our country's up and coming generation, the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) launched its Love Better primary prevention campaign, aimed at fostering safe, positive and equal relationships.

MSD has committed to a multi-phase campaign, partnering with advertising agency Clemenger BBDO to roll out the phases via a series of digital and in-person channels. The Love Better website was to become the central repository for all key information and messaging. It was to leverage the content partnership with Vice and showcase engaging social media content.

Voyage was chosen to lead the website project, and chose to bring on Not Another as the design partner. This decision was a no-brainer, with Not Another behind successful and arguably sensitive projects such as ‘Porn Week’, ‘Dial it Down Aotearoa’ and ‘Closed to Harassment’.

Through the discovery phase it became clear that the website had to be as accessible as possible and required an empathetic approach as it would cater to both young and potentially vulnerable or underserved groups. Voyage was able to make use of extensive research MSD had completed to establish the campaign as a whole, which included sentiments, desires and difficulties of young people in NZ. Ultimately, the website had to provide not only essential information, but leave users feeling reassured and informed for all things relationships and breakups. For this project Voyage and Not Another worked closely together, bringing together a wealth of expertise for development and design.

Supporting New Zealand’s youth

To create a website that is warm, engaging, interactive and visually appealing, this project required a human-centred design approach and focus on user experience. As a focal point for the broader Love Better campaign, the website had to be a central repository for the content across social media, while also offering a vast array of information and insights across the topics of love, dating, relationships and breakups.

Taking an emphatic and user-centric approach meant starting with MSD research on New Zealand’s young people to understand their needs, preferences and pain points, and also emphasised language and accessibility measures for vision and hearing-impaired users. Given the target demographic was those living in Aotearoa, Māori & English translations were also a priority.

The design phase included wireframing and prototyping to achieve the best possible flow of information, ensuring site visitors could easily find the information they need, with clever and unexpected elements making the website engaging, intuitive and memorable.

Making human-centered design centre stage

With an agile delivery process and two-week sprints, Voyage maintained continuous delivery and ample testing, with the ability to action changes and pivots as required. Everything was built to ensure ongoing ease and quality of deployments. Silverstripe CMS met the needs of the site, and being a Silverstripe Partner proved helpful in understanding how best to bring the vision to life.

Through Silverstripe, Voyage utilised customised content models, including complex features such as polls, quizzes and the opportunity for visitors to the site to express their own thoughts or feelings. On the frontend, modern build tools helped to realise the overall vision. Everything was designed to be easy to manage from the backend, with the MSD team able to update and edit content as needed.

As accessibility was a key element of the build, Voyage worked to the NZ Government Web Accessibility 1.1 and Web Usability 1.3 standards, teaming up with the MSD accessibility team to ensure coding standards were met.

Technical prowess and clever solutions, a match made in heaven

MSD wanted the Love Better website to be not only informative but captivating, and support Kiwi youth in one of the biggest parts of life: love and relationships. Voyage’s development expertise and Not Another’s creative abilities realised a site that is interactive, animated and visually relevant to the audience. Our next generation can learn, feel empowered, and share with their peers.

With thousands of visitors flocking to the site and positive, 'heartwarming' feedback filtering in, this project proves that a well considered, human-centric approach to design and development can realise powerful outcomes.

Thousands flock to the dynamic, digital experience

Ministry of Social Development

As part of the Ministry of Social Development’s extensive youth campaign, Love Better is an interactive and lively web experience designed for Aotearoa’s young people, helping them to navigate the tricky world of love and relationships in the 21st century.

Love Better

Silverstripe

Silverstripe Cloud

ViteJS

TypeScript

Tailwind CSS

Docker

As with many of our projects, for the MGH website build the Voyage team began with a series of intensive discovery workshop sessions. This allowed us to sit down with the primary stakeholders of the project and key leaders within the business, to better understand the internal and external influences that had to be considered. The discovery sessions included the MGH CEO, sales managers, investment managers, marketing managers and the Voyage experts.

The Voyage team took the MGH stakeholders through the foundational elements of the project. This included the scope, success criteria, key aspects that had to be included in the site, potential risks, and user interface considerations. 

The group had in-depth conversations around MGH’s key offerings, primarily house and land packages, first home buyers, and, of course, homes for sale, and how these could or needed to be positioned. In addition, it became clear the website had to factor in the different offices and allow visitors to tailor the information to their location or region - a feature that the old site didn’t accommodate.

Laying a strong foundation

To better understand the customer experience and how the site could be put together, the Voyage team created user personas and stories based on typical MGH customers. Aligned with MGH’s offerings, this included first home buyers, second home or family home buyers, home builders and investors.

Now it was time to put these learnings into practice. The first sitemaps and wireframes were put together for web and mobile devices, staying true to the core brand of MGH and extending the functionality, purpose and flow of the website. As much for the Voyage team as the MGH execs, this stage ensured everyone was on the same page, and everything worked together.

Building a framework to last

Dubbed ‘the most advanced headless CMS’, the Voyage team opted to use Sanity CMS as the foundation for the website build. This relatively new tech is an open source, API-based CMS built with React.js.

This enabled the Voyage experts to bring in maximum customisability, defining content models in JavaScript and integrating the site with MGH’s bespoke API and CRM. Uploading all houses available, Voyage also integrated leads with Pipedrive to streamline management and ensure no opportunities slipped through unattended.

Algolia, the suite of artificially intelligent search solutions, makes searching for anything on the new MGH website dramatically simplified, fast and easy - no matter what visitors are looking for. The site has also been populated with ample imagery and video content to engage visitors even further.

Maximising the use of advanced technologies

Design was a major factor for the new website, as is to be expected with a such a personal and visual product - a home. To ensure all stakeholders were happy with the final result, the design process required ongoing conversations between Voyage and MGH, with Voyage experts tasked with maintaining expectations, offering expertise and insight, and staying on budget.

The final result sees the MGH website remaining true to the original brand palette of red, black and white, while also developing it further to modernise the look and feel, and add warmth to the final product.

Alongside design, dedicated time and attention was put on the frontend experience to improve the overall flow, bring in engaging animations, and add useful integrations and tools such as an investment calculator, a section dedicated to home development, a new blog section with filter search.

Overall, the refreshed MGH website is visually engaging, simple and easy to manage in the backend, with the MGH team able to edit and change content and sections as is relevant and necessary as the business continues to grow.

A seemingly effortless frontend design

Mike Greer Homes, an award-winning New Zealand home designer and builder, partnered with Voyage to enhance their online presence. This led to a comprehensive website rebuild that elevated and showcased the company's core offerings.

Mike Greer Homes

Sanity CMS

Next.js

Algolia

Design

Empowering the journey to a new home through a seamless, intuitive and modern website.

We were approached by Two Raw Sisters to design & develop an iOS and Android mobile app that would inspire all eaters to rethink the way they traditionally start a meal - by making plants the centrepiece of the table.

The app gives subscribers access to 500+ nutritionally approved recipes, meal plans, women’s health features, and a customised shopping list.

Recipes that make all eaters feel great.

In collaboration with Two Raw Sisters, Voyage developed the design of the app by focusing on the user experience and making sure the app was easy to use.

The team set up DatoCMS for the content and built the app using the react native framework.

The app was tested using the iOS sandbox and play store before being passed over to the client to do user acceptance testing alongside a select number of test users.

Once the feedback from user acceptance testing was incorporated, the apps were submitted for review, and ready to be published.

The first version of the app was released on 27 March 2023 and provides the foundation on which the app can be improved and developed further overtime to meet the needs of users.

Prioritising ease of use and search-ability

For the mobile app to be successful, we knew that it required systems that were as easy to use as the product itself.

Key deliverables included displaying 350+ nutritionally approved recipes and meal plans, handling user favourites, implementing a customised shopping list, and enabling user subscriptions.

To achieve this, the app was built using React Native, which is an industry-standard framework for cross-platform development. We opted to use DatoCMS for content management due to its ease of use and quick learning curve. To ensure easy management of subscriptions, we implemented RevenueCat, which allowed the data to be managed in one place.

Overall, the combination of these technologies helped us meet the deliverables and create a top-notch user experience for both iOS and Android users.

Outcome

Two Raw Sisters

From best-selling cookbooks to an internationally-recognised app (that’s where we come in), Two Raw Sisters have paved the way for simple, delicious, and nutritious meals, born from their personal passion and love for food is a way to come together while also fuelling our bodies with what’s best.

React Native

Auth0

RevenueCat

Sparking creativity with food and cooking through a refreshing and functional app

, directly translated to ‘Line of Defence of New Zealand’, is our country’s three-branched military, made up of the Navy, Army and Air Force. Responsible for the protection of national security and humanitarian efforts, the organisation consists of thousands of employees across a broad range of roles.

As a trusted partner of the NZDF marketing team for more than five years, Voyage has continuously enhanced the NZDF Careers site. Our journey began with the initial build and has evolved through multiple updates, improvements, and maintenance of previous iterations. This enduring collaboration, marked by high-quality deliverables and professionalism, led to Voyage being entrusted with a full site refresh, further showcasing the depth of roles and diverse entry pathways within NZDF's primary defence forces.

As a result of extensive workshop sessions and research between NZDF and Voyage, the team identified key pain points and improvements that would maximise value, including:

Enhancing the user experience to make it easier to find information.

Improving system functionality and search capabilities.

Showcasing life at NZDF in an engaging way.

Streamlining content management for the content editors.

Welcoming new recruits to a modern and engaging website

The Voyage team was tasked with making the new NZDF Careers site fast, functional, easy and enjoyable to navigate. Two primary areas of focus for the new site were user experience and enhanced search and navigation, to help visitors find what they’re looking for and be guided through an exploration of roles.

Prior to the full refresh project, Voyage worked with NZDF Careers to improve the existing site. This included implementing a new information architecture (IA) complete with hundreds of pages of content. Based on the outcomes of the IA review and redesign, for the refresh the developers reorganised and simplified areas of the CMS editing experience. Where required, migration scripts were created to move or restructure data.

The initial site build also included a full-stack development with CWP SilverStripe, all with the overarching aim of helping people find their career path. It was decided that the new site would remain with Silverstripe, to ease the transition for both employees and resources, but included considerable improvements to enhance everything from speed to backend content edits.

Finally, we leveraged the momentum of the Codewords campaign, integrating relevant content from other NZDF resources to demonstrate the breadth and impact of NZDF operations to potential recruits.

Taking the existing site build to a whole new level

The new site features improved navigation, expanded filter options, and more informative role cards. To align with the Defence Force’s Bicultural Policy, Te Reo Māori translations were incorporated across the site, while accessibility considerations open up the user experience to more Kiwis.

Algolia's AI-powered search tool was implemented to enhance speed and relevance in job searches. As an AI search tool, Algolia’s API offers speed and relevance, resulting in improved user experience, especially for something as important as careers. Utilising the power of AI, in an instant the tool can weigh and compare matching terms to arrive at the best one.

Additional search innovations included a more prominent placement of the search bar, expanded filter options, popular role tags and improved role cards, a more impactful and considered menu, and more useful information at a glance.

Putting the spotlight on search and navigation

NZDF Careers Homepage Desktop

Upon first opening the new NZDF Careers site, visitors are encouraged to ‘Run Deep With Us’, and search for one of more than 100 defence roles. This striking opening tells the story of the full site refresh - bold, impactful, direct and functional.

NZDF Careers showcases the depth of roles within the primary defence forces while highlighting diverse entry pathways. From school leavers to university graduates and trade apprenticeships, the site demonstrates multiple routes into NZDF, inspiring both new and experienced professionals to join the ranks.

The combination of the in-depth discovery phase, informed design, advanced tech solutions, and depth and breadth of Voyage’s in-house expertise helped to realise this empowering end result. The final site brings to life the initial conversations with key stakeholders, including end users and NZDF leaders, while also mitigating the realities of solutions and budget.

NZDF Careers utilises a variety of mediums and design elements to tell an engaging story of our country’s first lines of defence, and inspires those both beginning or embarking on a new phase of their career.

Inspiring more people to choose a career with NZDF

New Zealand Defence Force

New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) partnered with Voyage to revamp their Careers site, focusing on improving user experience to make the site more modern and engaging.

New Zealand Defence Careers 

Encouraging recruitment and engagement with New Zealand’s Defence Force

Voyage was brought onboard to build the Design Your Fire (DYF) solution. The aim was to create a tool that captured the customisation available to customers, enhance customer engagement and showcase the new electrical fireplace product line.

To launch this new line, Escea was hosting an important event for stakeholders and customers alike, with many flying into Dunedin for the occasion. With six weeks up their sleeves, the Voyage team had to hit the ground running.

Escea's DYF tool was developed using Next.js and React, was hosted on Vercel, and built on Sanity CMS for a seamless user experience. The Voyage team included functionality that allows customers to personalise fireplace by features such as glass type, dimensions, heat output, efficiency and remote control options.

Interactive views were designed to offer different angles, night and TV modes, and enhance the user's ability to envision the fireplace in their own space. The tool was also made to handle product variations and specifications tailored to different markets, a crucial element for Escea’s international offerings.

Delivering an interactive and personable experience

Next.js and React formed the foundation for frontend development and interactive user interfaces. The Sanity CMS was chosen for its flexibility in managing content across various platforms, including kiosks and the website. GROQD facilitated efficient querying within Sanity, optimising data retrieval and management, and Tailwind CSS, Radix UI + ShadCN were used to establish a cohesive design system, ensuring consistency and flexibility in UI components.

A collaborative approach between Escea’s team and Voyage’s experts ensured design aesthetics were aligned with a responsive layout and backend. Agile methodologies were employed so the team could meet the tight timelines and facilitate iterative development. Throughout the entire process, the emphasis was on intuitive navigation and visual appeal to engage and excite customers on the way to acquiring their new fireplace.

Bridging the gap between function and aesthetics

Having a global team proved to be a big benefit for Voyage, with last minute requirements making a tight deadline even tighter. With the event fast approaching, the New Zealand team were notified of a last minute change just as they were logging off for the day. The London developer duo, Jess Small and Keziah Rackley-Gale, who had led the majority of the project, were able to pick up where the Kiwi team left off, helping to bring the project to a close.

The Voyage team effectively completed the DYF tool, with all browser compatibility requirements accounted for, and with ample flexibility built in to accommodate future changes and updates. At Escea’s electrical fire launch event, the DYF tool significantly enhanced customer engagement and satisfaction, driving sales of the company’s high-end fireplace products.

Meeting all requirements

Escea’s collaboration with Voyage on the DYF tool is an excellent example of how powerful digital solutions can enhance customer interaction and omnichannel success. By leveraging technologies such as Sanity CMS and a collaborative development process, Escea continues to maintain its spot as a leader in the fireplace industry, catering to a global audience with personalised and interactive experiences.

The DYF project is another win for Voyage as we continue to be committed to shipping tailored, impactful digital solutions that align with client goals and empower businesses to rise to the top of a competitive marketplace.

Driving customer satisfaction through clever digital tools

Escea

Modern living room with fireplace, beige sofas, and built-in shelving. Dark wood-paneled wall contrasts with light decor.

With the catchphrase, ‘More flame, less frame’, Escea was born out of the chilly city of Dunedin with one mission in mind: to lead the way in the fireplace industry. Now delivering fireplaces to people around the world, the company is focused on improving its customer experience and utilising digital tools to do just that.

Escea Design Your Fire

React

Customer service done right with Escea's fully customised app

Jucy Group, a leading camper van and rental car company in Australia and New Zealand, embarked on a mission to redefine the RV website landscape following their acquisition of Star RV. Wanting to do things a bit differently to other rental websites, they turned to Voyage to craft an immersive and captivating online experience. With clear navigation, simplified headers and segments, and a striking emphasis on visuals, the new website inspires adventure in people of all ages.

The Star RV website centres around the concept of "Star Stories" where the vivid adventures and personal narratives of Star RV users can take centre stage. This inspired the creation of a multimedia-rich digital experience that relied heavily on engaging videos and captivating imagery to narrate these stories, serving as the storytelling canvas.

, a creative studio versed in storytelling for brands to help bring the adventures to life. Together we meticulously crafted the visual identity and user experience that would distinctly position the Star RV website in a league of its own.

Prototyping in Figma to realise visual excellence

From here we embarked on an iterative prototyping journey, translating design thinking into interactive Figma prototypes. The essence of Star Stories was our guiding light, bringing our design decisions together with key strategic intent. Through intentional placements of videos and images, our aim was to not only captivate users' attention but also immerse them in the genuine RV experience, ensuring that brand storytelling resonated with authenticity.

Our process

Leveraging advanced tech stacks to realise value

Our tech stack was instrumental in turning design visions into reality. By utilising the capabilities of React, TypeScript, and Next.js, we sculpted a dynamic and high-performing frontend, harnessing the efficiency of statically generated pages. Our project was built on an advanced design system anchored by Tailwind CSS, which enables rapid iteration, scalability and consistency.

When approaching the project build we wanted to make sure we were meeting accessibility standards, so we integrated Radix UI, a low-level UI component library with accessibility built in from day one. Alongside Class Variance Authority (CVA) to manage styling variants, this helped form the foundation of our design system. Development was further enhanced through the utilisation of Storybook for isolated UI component construction, making sure we had a comprehensive and efficient approach to building modular elements.

Leveraging Headless CMS with video and personalisation functionality

To empower the content management process, we integrated Strapi as the backend CMS, streamlining the process for effortless content updates. As a headless CMS, Strapi is designed for content-rich experiences, which was exactly what we needed for StarRV. It greatly simplifies content management, from creation to consumption, across all digital devices.

A pivotal part of the backend was the need to support unparalleled video experience. While imagery was important, video allowed us to convey the evocative emotions of travel, sharing star stories of those who found something special with StarRV. Instead of relying on conventional video platforms such as YouTube or Vimeo, we implemented Mux. This technology allowed us to exercise greater control over video playback and presentation, ensuring a personalised, immersive encounter for users.

Taking an iterative and quality driven approach

Iterative development and rigorous quality assurance ensures we can preview our work at every stage, while also enabling quicker testing and the merging of new features. It also allows us to monitor performance, accessibility and adherence to best practices, with automated reports offering insights into what’s working and what can be improved.

Our work with StarRV was a resounding success, as we were able to deliver against our client’s core objectives. We made sure editing and managing the site was simple and easy for the StarRV team, visitors to the site could easily find stunning and personal travel stories about trips throughout Australia and New Zealand, and those who had booked with the site were encouraged to share their own stories to keep the site fresh and engaging. The end result of the back and frontend work was an uptake in vehicle bookings, as people were inspired to explore their backyard and beyond.

Star RV

A couple sitting outside their Star RV rental

Meticulously crafting a visual identity and user experience that would distinctly position the StarRV Website in a league of it’s own

GraphQL

Strapi

Radix UI

Right from the start we knew the website had to cater to educators, meaning teachers, homeschooling parents, and other key stakeholders within the community and sector. Overall, our job was to provide a central repository to find resources, tools and inspiration easily, efficiently and enjoyably.

In the discovery sessions, our design and development leads gathered important information, offered various solutions or options, gained clarity over what the Netsafe team wanted and what they didn’t, and began to formulate our direction and the scope of the project.

Bringing the tools and resources to educators around New Zealand

Two main findings from the discovery sessions were around the login and ease of use. When it came to how the site would function, the Voyage experts quickly came to the conclusion that the main homepage would be minimal in content offered, and the greater repository of content and tools would exist behind the login.

In this way, the Netsafe team would have insight into who was using the resource, and could ensure it’s only used by educators and isn’t being plagiarised. On ease of use, as the former Netsafe site was an overly complicated WordPress site, it was important that the Kete Education Hub would be simple to navigate, and find and edit content.

Finalising important details

Finalising a sitemap using the Octopus visual sitemap tool and website planner allowed Voyage to create a thorough overview of how the final site would be organised and structured. At this juncture, Netsafe had the chance to flag anything that needed changing and give the final go-ahead to development.

Next came designs. This required a couple of iterations to ensure the colour palette and general aesthetic experience of the web platform suited all stakeholders. The final decision saw Voyage moving away from the original Netsafe blues and colour tones to a more pastel, calming palette.

The design phase coincided with a re-brand for Netsafe, which required the Voyage experts to adapt in kind, while also not losing sight of the conclusions reached during the discovery sessions.

This project was also an excellent opportunity for the Voyage team to implement the principles and practice of content modelling. Essentially, this is a process that allows us to map out the content of a website or app so we know exactly what we need and why. It also flags what we’ll need at each point of the site build to ensure the finished product is fully functional and serves its purpose.

Creating sitemaps and designs for a winning website

The final Kete Education Hub boasts a whole host of features and functionality, captures the new direction of the Netsafe brand, and delivers on the wish list compiled by the stakeholders in the initial discovery sessions.

Educators that visit the site are invited to set up a login, create a profile with chosen details about themselves and their role, and peruse the resources at their leisure, saving their favourites to their personal kete. These resources include information blogs and content, as well as interactive tools and quizzes. With a streamlined menu, it’s straightforward to hunt out content based on a specific query or topic, for instance year groups, staying safe online, or advice for parents and school staff.

A fully functional and intuitive education hub

Bringing in top tech to solve real challenges

During the website build, the development team came up with simple and elegant solutions for Netsafe’s wish list. SanityCMS was foundational in making maintenance, organisation and editing of the site much simpler. It also effectively safeguards the site for future ideas and iterations as it’s very easy to add in more micro-sites and features, and to continue to build out content over time.

MagicLinks was used to make the login process one-click and remove any worries about passwords. Supabase was used for authentication and user management, NextJs for a beautiful frontend, Vercel for optimised hosting, and Algolia to make search as functional as possible.

Simplicity, customisation and accessibility were all aspects of this website build that went above and beyond brief. The Netsafe team can add, change, update and build out any resource or aspect of the site with ease in the backend of the CMS, which is much more streamlined than their previous Wordpress site.

The capability review tool, created to generate a strong culture of online safety and digital citizenship across schools and students, was made completely from scratch and enables educators to assess current capability, identify areas for development, and track progress towards school online safety goals.

Finally, accessibility is something we’re very passionate about at Voyage - after all, we want as many people as possible to be able to use digital platforms. We included key considerations around colour contrast and usability from the front and backend to make sure both the Netsafe team and educators could use the Kete fully.

Netsafe

Netsafe and Voyage have teamed up on a multi-phased project, with the Kete Education Hub the first phase. As with any long-term relationship, first we had to get to know each other. Our initial discovery workshops laid out the plan and created a priority list so we knew where we were starting, and thus the education hub project began.

Netsafe Kete

Supabase

Creating a web platform that delivers resources and inspiration to New Zealand’s educators.

Kat McCorkindale is Lifetime’s General Manager of Technology and Marketing. She recalls, “I joined Lifetime seven years ago. It’s been a rollercoaster adventure because we were a team of around 60 when I started and now there are over 100 of us. Most shareholders are employees, so it’s a really radical, exciting company to work for and I love what we do.”

“We all live and breathe our purpose of creating greater financial certainty. We help people with their business and personal financial requirements, from accounting and insurance to mortgages and investments. And we support clients at every life stage from buying their first home to planning their legacy. But at the end of the day, our goal is always to achieve your financial goals. How do we get you living your best life?”

Meeting a purposeful business

From evolving their website to building the My Lifetime app

Kat started working with Voyage in 2018 when we took over management of their website. Kat says, “Voyage took over our site and gave it a revamp. I got to know the team and see just how capable and competent they were. They did a few clever upgrades and feature enhancements and their innovative thinking was refreshing. They suggested ways we could structure data to deliver better client experiences and online user journeys.”

“However, our website is a very small part of the value Voyage have added to Lifetime. Voyage is so much more than web development, they're a full 

. As Lifetime grows we have digital transformation needs, so when we looked at building an app for our clients it was natural to have a conversation with Voyage.”

“Together, we built a prototype of the My Lifetime app

 It was a very enjoyable process and we were so chuffed with the result. The first things we did was get all our investment clients on the new app. That solved a big pain point. A third party provided our previous investment management platform, and it was so clunky people found it very difficult to use. The new app is clean and simple, and we got a lot of great feedback that gave our wider leadership team and our board confidence to continue to invest in the product.”

From evolving their website to building the My Lifetime app 

The success of the app led to another digital project designed to improve Lifetime’s internal processes while elevating their customer experience at the same time.

Kat explains, “Our CRM system stores all our client data. It's our backbone, but it isn’t always easy to use, so we wanted to make entering customer data easier for our advisors. At the same time, we were trying to create a competitive advantage and onboarding was an opportunity to stand out. Onboarding with financial advisors is traditionally clunky and painful. So, we talked to Voyage about how we could make it more fun and engaging.”

We built our Digital Discovery platform to help clients through a slick, interactive onboarding experience. We aim to capture all their hopes and desires about money to understand what they want to achieve with Lifetime. We also use it for progress check ins and to capture detailed data for specific services. The platform is fully integrated with our CRM system. Every field is painstakingly mapped to make sure data never has to be duplicated.”

“The first release of the Digital Discovery platform was rolled out in December 2022. Thousands of clients have used the tool. Almost 60% of our client engagements are going through the platform, which one year in is pretty good. And the feedback we've had is really cool. Improving our client experience was our number one goal. But a huge driver was also user experience. It's a competitive market out there. We have to recruit and retain the best financial advisors we can. These days advisors are asking during the recruitment process, what tools we use, so we want to make sure we've something compelling and enjoyable.”

Making onboarding fun and engaging 

Lifetime built their new client onboarding module first because they wanted to be sure that module was delivering value before building the whole Digital Discovery suite. Kat says, “The onboarding module is the only form that gets sent to clients for them to complete in their own home. So, it was a real test of good user interface design. Would clients not only start it, but actually finish it, and what quality data would they put in?”

The onboarding module was also solving a big pain point. Kat says, “In the financial advice industry, many firms’ onboarding processes ask clients to fill out 20-page documents. As you’d expect, most people don’t do this. We smashed our target with that first module. Clients are completing the new onboarding form with really high quality data, which means our meetings with them are better because we’re straight into the good stuff. That leads to us being more efficient. Those gains are coming through in our client satisfaction survey.”

“The big thing for me is we're having better client conversations and getting better results for us and our clients. We're an advice business. Our logo is a speech mark. Having wider conversations and understanding our clients better means we’re uncovering more ways to add value and introducing clients to more areas of the business, a key metric for us.”

“Also, by putting a structure around onboarding, we support our team and our clients through the process. Some of the stuff we talk about isn’t easy. We discuss things that can make couples argue and people cry. It's pretty challenging sometimes. But the questions have to be asked for us to do our job. Having the questions there on the screen in the Digital Discovery platform helps our advisers not shy away from those difficult topics.”

“One thing our clients like about us is we're a one-stop shop. Lifetime can handle your accounting, your loans and insurance, and your investments, but different people within Lifetime need to coordinate with each other to make this work. The Discovery platform gives all our specialists the data they need to collaborate and deliver good outcomes faster.”

“Another big win for me as a marketer is better client data. It’s accurate, up to date, and stored in the right place in the right format. We can anticipate client needs better, run better campaigns, create better apps and digital tools. Better data allows us to deliver more value.”

Solving onboarding pain points 

Every organisation hits that point in their growth curve where their digital systems need an overhaul. Whether that’s updating a clunky app or overhauling an inefficient, manual process like Lifetime’s old onboarding form, digital transformation isn’t always easy. Here’s a few words of advice from us and from Kat.

Don’t bite off more than you can chew. Come up with a simple first iteration of your solution that you can build to validate your return on investment. Don’t throw lots of cash at something complicated that won’t get you what you need.

Solid project management and partnership is key to delivering good results. The relationship we have with Lifetime is a two-way street. We’re always looking for the best way to solve their problems. We propose ideas and think big picture. The important thing for us is to build long-term partnerships with all our clients where we push each other to be better.

Kat’s biggest challenge with the Digital Discovery platform wasn’t technical. It was getting the Lifetime team to use the tool. She explains, “It took time for our team to embrace the platform, even though it seemed like a no-brainer. But we’ve a team of experienced people who’d learned our old systems and gotten really good at doing things one way. When you change the way you do things, it’s an obstacle to overcome. So even getting our team to adopt the onboarding module took persuading. But once they saw our clients enjoying the process and started to see the value, we started to see a positive trend.”

“It's hard to get your team on board. There’s a balance between letting them know they’ve been heard and making it clear that making a suggestion doesn't mean their idea will be used. The best tools aren't designed by committee. It comes back to the tried and tested principles of agile project management. Keep each step as simple as possible. And always communicate your why to your team, so they understand why you're doing this and what's in it for them. It’s not just about why something’s good for your shareholders and clients.”

Digitising your client engagement tools and systems 

Our goal is to be Lifetime’s technical partner for their digital marketing and product development needs, coming up with thought starters and helping drive solutions. Kat agrees. “Voyage understand our business so well. When Lifetime has a strategy discussion, I have that same conversation with my Voyage team, sharing what we’re hoping to achieve. I trust Voyage to know us and our needs because they’ve proven they deliver.”

“Obviously, their technical competency is excellent, but who they are as people matters too. They’re honest … sometimes almost to a commercial fault because they’re about the long-term relationship. If I've a strong view or I'm not happy about something, I feel so comfortable raising it. When you've got trust, you can have healthy conflict. If you don't have trust, you pull back from those tough conversations. We've got that fundamental strength in the relationship. We’re one team and that makes me very loyal to them.”

“I also trust Voyage to operate efficiently. They pitch ideas to match our budget and company size and build to anticipate our growth and future needs. One of my favourite things is they’re pragmatic with their design. Sometimes you come across development teams who want to use the latest, cutting-edge tech stack. That might be exciting for them, but it might require more learning for us, or come with more risk because it's not an established platform with full support. Voyage understand we're all about stable, mature tech because we're financial advisers.”

A loyal long-term partnership

The test of any relationship is when things go wrong. We asked Kat if she’s happy with how things are handled when the wheels fall off. Kat explains, “There will always be tricky bits in any technical project. There are going to be times where we fail to scope adequately or something isn't tested properly. The key thing is it's not about blame. With Voyage, we share each other's problems and pitfalls and it's never about finger pointing. It's very much a partnership. We're one team that shares failures and successes.”

“The good news is for the most part, we haven't had anything major go wrong. Sure, we've had bugs. That happens in software dev. Even Microsoft and Apple have bugs. So, we expect things to go wrong. It’s about how you respond when they do and Voyage is good at triaging high priority bugs fast. Also, we take responsibility on our end not to cry wolf. If we call something a priority one fix, it had better be urgent. And Voyage don't ever compromise on quality or safety. We’re pleased about that because we store people's important personal data, and the safety of our clients is paramount.”

“As much as I enjoy sharing what I’ve learned working with Voyage, I can't tell you to trust them. Trust has to be earned. But I can tell you how much I trust Voyage and how successful the projects we've done together have been. You don't work with a company for five years and increase your budget with them every year if you're not getting results. So, start small and give Voyage a crack on something simple. They'll prove themselves fast.”

One team, sharing failures and successes

Lifetime

Lifetime’s a nationwide advisory firm providing lifelong financial certainty for New Zealanders. Since 2018, they’ve been developing apps to improve their customer experience, solve problems, and grow.

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