Every day, more of our interactions take place online. identity.com aims to build trust across the internet with digital identity verification and its specific B2B offering, the Verified iD API. This is my story of how we laid the foundation for the first iteration of the API.
Every day, more of our interactions take place online. identity.com aims to build trust across the internet with digital identity verification and its specific B2B offering, the Verified iD API. This is my story of how we laid the foundation for the first iteration of the API.
Every day, more of our interactions take place online. identity.com aims to build trust across the internet with digital identity verification and its specific B2B offering, the Verified iD API. This is my story of how we laid the foundation for the first iteration of the API.
Every day, more of our interactions take place online. identity.com aims to build trust across the internet with digital identity verification and its specific B2B offering, the Verified iD API. This is my story of how we laid the foundation for the first iteration of the API.
Product Designer
Leya Leydiker, Matt Muller — Product Managers
Avinash Parida — Product Designer
Xander & James Groeneveld, Drew Monroe, Tyler Childs — Developers
Britain Hammond — QA Engineer
Brent Etiz, Tiffany Lien — Business Development
Matthew Monahan — CEO
I worked on this project from August - December 2015. The project launched after my departure from the team in early 2016.
Learn more at identity.com
For companies that want to build trust within their communities at sign-up, the Verified iD API combines public records, Knowledge-Based Authentication, and Photo ID + Document Authentication to validate users are who they say they are. It was meant to help companies focus back on their users and the products they were building without having to worry about the risk of bad actors.
When I began working at iD, we initially tested whether consumers would be interested in protecting their identity by offering identity protection. While we learned that there was an intent mismatch on the consumer side, we wanted to test if there was interest on the B2B side. We shifted our strategy to begin building out a full plan to launch the new verification API offering.
My role was to coordinate the last significant components before launch: lead the design direction of the Customer Portal and initial marketing landing page design. We needed to build on the new momentum the team was on to deliver before the end of Q4 2015.
When I began working at iD, we initially tested whether consumers would be interested in protecting their identity by offering identity protection. While we learned that there was an intent mismatch on the consumer side, we wanted to test if there was interest on the B2B side. We shifted our strategy to begin building out a full plan to launch the new verification API offering.
My role was to coordinate the last significant components before launch: lead the design direction of the Customer Portal and initial marketing landing page design. We needed to build on the new momentum the team was on to deliver before the end of Q4 2015.
During our first initial meeting with all stakeholders, we hashed out the critical steps we needed to take before launch. While some projects were already in motion (part of the API and the API Documentation), we also had a few more things on the list. I began with a preliminary flow we all agreed on as next steps.
This flow took 3-4 iterations. This exercise allowed me to get clarity and helped the team articulate urgency, challenges, and setting deadlines/expectations to the broader company.
During our first initial meeting with all stakeholders, we hashed out the critical steps we needed to take before launch. While some projects were already in motion (part of the API and the API Documentation), we also had a few more things on the list. I began with a preliminary flow we all agreed on as next steps.
This flow took 3-4 iterations. This exercise allowed me to get clarity and helped the team articulate urgency, challenges, and setting deadlines/expectations to the broader company.
Along with the API, we needed to provide the tools for our customers to have the ability to maintain and understand usage. With that, our primary goal was to build an MVP focused on helping our key users and their needs:
Paired with Avinash (product designer), we tackled various parts of the customer dashboard. The features included: Metrics Dashboard, API Key Management, Admin Management, API Customization, and Help & Support.
As a team, we narrowed down an MVP based on two factors:
We wanted to pursue insights on the number of Verifications, costs, total users, and verification attempts.
Account dropdown (top right), Default Day Date Range, Date dropdown, Hover tooltip insights
From prior user research for our internal iD admin tool, one of the biggest gripes from our teammates was the number of clicks to perform an activity.
In this case, we allowed editing directly on the page. Depending on the sensitivity of the action, interactions can be easily accessible or intentionally buried.
Applications Default, Editing, Show Application Secret, Create New Application, Delete Confirmation
UI wise, we wanted to ensure consistency with the Application Keys page. The interactions are very much similar to in-line editing and lightbox interactions.
UI wise, we wanted to ensure consistency with the Application Keys page. The interactions are very much similar with in-line editing and lightbox interactions.
Admin management default, Edit view, Delete confirmation, Create new admin lightbox, and Error state
Lastly, we wanted to ensure that users could find what they need without having to reach out. If FAQ answers were not enough, we also had easy access to the API Documentation, and contact information of who to reach out to in Team iD.
Admin management default, Edit view, Delete confirmation, Create new admin lightbox, and Error state
One of the major components to building out the feature was marketing the product. Gathering insights from our Business Development team, were able to design for the key decision makers. The marketing landing page focused on two key audiences:
As a company, we've never embarked on creating or marketing an API product. We wanted to look at analogous pages that we could evaluate and look to as good examples.
Stripe Checkout, Stripe Subscription, and Twilio.
Our first take on it was a simple page with just enough information to gather interest. Most importantly, we provided a space for folks to contact us.
When someone gives you the chance to do something you have no idea how to accomplish, do it. When I started my role at Inflection, I was a "Design Associate" meaning that I filled in whatever design role that the team needed. Working on such a complex product led to a collaborative process ensuring the direction of the product led to success. This experience fostered my passion for product design today.
While the majority of the original team has moved on, I'm incredibly proud of the foundation we built for the direction of iD. We were there when we failed. "Failure" is often stigmatized but seeing the work we did initially fall apart accelerated my growth (and curiosity). I wouldn't be where I am today without the experience with Team iD (2014-2015).