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← Back to workQuickBooks Live had traditionally supported SMBs through operational services like bookkeeping and payroll. This work explored a different kind of customer need: high-stakes business decisions around formation and entity structure. I helped define this new service from early research through pilot and product definition, shaping what kinds of guidance customers actually needed and how that support could become a trusted part of their journey.
To understand what customers actually needed help with, I worked closely with my team to synthesize insights from 1,500+ surveys, 250+ hours of customer interviews, and 45+ hours of expert sessions.
The biggest insight was that customers didn’t need a filing tool, they needed a trusted guide to help them make the right decision before they filed. That insight reframed the opportunity and shaped the strategy behind the entire experience.
Before the service was fully defined, I used rapid prototypes to explore how it could actually work. That gave the team a faster way to test the structure of the experience from intake and matching to the expert session and what customers should walk away with
Once the model became clearer, I designed the pilot experience end to end — from intake and session structure to the personalized Formation Roadmap customers received afterward. The goal was to make a high-stakes decision feel more clear, supportive, and actionable.
Early pilot feedback was strong: 4.6 / 5 satisfaction and 100% would recommend, with customers specifically calling out the human connection and personalized guidance.
In ambiguous 0→1 work, speed comes from making ideas testable early.
We were able to clearly identify that customers needed decision support, not just a filing tool, through deep research and early prototyping. Using AI to quickly make ideas tangible helped us test directions earlier, create alignment faster, and give the team something real to react to before the service was fully defined.