CASE STUDY

Simplified AI-Powered Reputation Management for Healthcare

Swell — UX/UI Design, Live Chat Integration & Customer Journey Research.

Overview

Swell automatically gathers private and public feedback from patients and employees so healthcare practices can improve their online reputation, patient experience, and employee satisfaction. Its customer base spans dentistry, vision, pediatrics, dermatology, urgent care, plastic surgery, neurosurgery, veterinary, and mental/behavioral health practices — including companies like Modento, Nexhealth, Dental Intelligence, Planet DDS, and PatientNow. Demo requests and free trial sign-ups were seeing weak visibility and engagement, with growth flattening. The solutions I brought combined new analytics infrastructure, formal persona-based research, a simplified customer journey, a live chat integration, and a reimagined brand experience — together generating never before seen engagement and impacted a flat baseline of ~$3.5M (ARR 2020-2023) to a sudden $5.7M (2024) representing ~63% YoY revenue increase.

SUMMARY

Role

UX/UI design, live chat integration, user journey mapping, website/brand architecture, research/analysis, creative direction, photography, iconography, Product Logos, CRO, and SEO.

Approximately 8 weeks total — 3 weeks of analytics implementation and data collection to support the initial customer journey analysis, followed by roughly 5 weeks of ideation, prototyping, testing, and brand development with Swell's team.

Timeline

Tools

Figma, FigJam, Adobe Creative Suite (XD, Photoshop, Illustrator), Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, Slack.

THE CHALLENGES

User pain points

Swell serves a broad and varied audience — from solo dental practices to multi-location veterinary and behavioral health groups — and the existing site struggled to speak clearly to all of them at once. Demo requests and free trial sign-ups in particular became stagnate and weakening in engagement.

Reverse flattening growth in these key conversion actions while making the site's messaging resonate across every healthcare vertical it served.

Business goals

Evidence

Existing tracked metrics showed slow, flattening progress specifically around demo requests and free trial engagement with CTA buttons often leading away. The bounce rates for the demo and free trial forms also showed trends of steady drop-off — the clearest signal that the current site and journey weren't converting visitors into qualified leads, regardless of vertical.

(Swell homepage prior to UX/UI redesign & rebrand)

(Swell homepage and CTAs on mobile prior to UX/UI redesign & rebrand)

TARGET AUDIENCE & RESEARCH

Healthcare practices and groups across ten+ specialties — dentistry, vision, pediatrics, dermatology, urgent care, pain management, plastic surgery, neurosurgery, veterinary, and mental/behavioral health — ranging from independent practices to larger multi-location healthcare companies.

Because the audience was so broad, developing formal user personas was treated as a critical first step rather than an afterthought. Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity were implemented specifically to build a formal research and analysis process where little had existed before. After roughly three weeks of data collection, an initial customer journey analysis was performed in close collaboration with Swell's VP of Creative, VP of Marketing, and their content team.

Target groups

Research methods

Key findings

Working directly with the two VPs and their content team, the team established distinct user personas, crafted user scenarios for each, conducted initial usability testing, and produced a simplified user journey map. This confirmed that a single, one-size-fits-all message and journey wasn't serving the range of healthcare specialties Swell supported — each persona needed messaging and a path through the site tailored to their specific vertical.

(Insights and summaries of friction and flattened unique visitors)

IDEATION & STRATEGY

Rather than redesigning around a single generic customer, the strategy centered on the personas and scenarios developed during research — ensuring the new site could speak directly to a dental practice, a veterinary group, or a behavioral health provider without diluting the message for any of them.

The simplified user journey map became the backbone for reducing friction at the site's most important conversion points: requesting a demo, starting a free trial, and finding product details.

Persona-driven strategy

Journey simplification

Collaborative process

Ideation, prototyping, and testing were conducted in close, ongoing collaboration with Swell's VPs and content team over the roughly five-week build phase, keeping the personas and journey map as the key connective points from research to final design.

Why this direction?

Given that the core business problem was flattening engagement specifically at demo and trial conversion points, the strategic priority was to shorten and clarify the path to those two actions across every persona's journey — rather than a broader visual refresh alone. This was paired with new brand elements and brand strategy so the simplified journey and the visual identity would launch together.

UX/UI DESIGN & SOLUTION

Rebuilt with broadened messaging able to speak to each persona across Swell's healthcare verticals, rather than a single generic value proposition.

Reduced the number of steps required to reach a CTA for requesting a demo, starting a free trial, and accessing product details — directly addressing the flattening engagement identified as challenges.

Broad yet tailored experience

Simplified conversion paths

Live chat integration

Led the design and implementation of the full chat experience — the chat launcher widget, conversation UI, typing indicators, suggested prompts, feedback options, and the escalation process to route conversations to the appropriate sales or support team. Further streamlining customer interactions.

Brand identity

Developed new brand elements and strategy alongside the UX work, including logo updates, brand system changes, typography, iconography, brand architecture, and color palette — launched together with the simplified journey as one cohesive relaunch.

RESULTS & LEARNINGS

Measured Outcomes, Not Just Aesthetics

+74%

An increase of 74% in demo requests resulted within first year of the new website, brand identity, and digital experience launch.

+63%

Impacted a flat baseline of ~$3.5M (ARR 2020-2023) to a sudden $5.7M (2024) representing ~63% YoY revenue increase.

+46%

Conversion rates with the free trial user flows increased across the website following the launch climbing 46% from 2023 to 2024.

CONCLUSIONS

What went well

Treating persona development as a required first step — not jumping straight to design as the Swell team had originally anticipated — meant the eventual messaging and journey simplification could speak credibly to a genuinely wide range of healthcare specialties instead of defaulting to generic healthcare messaging. Close, sustained collaboration with Swell's VP of Creative, VP of Marketing, and content team throughout both the research and build phases kept the personas and journey map grounded by domain knowledge.

Additional pre-launch baseline research such as specific user interviews and usability testing. A more in-depth analysis with insights further quantitative insights from GA and qualitative analysis using session recordings, heatmaps, frustration metrics such as rage clicks and dead clicks. AI summaries and additional behavior trends would have been able to turn more data questions into instant answers.

What could still improve

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