A case study by Praxent

Embedded business banking launched
in 5 months

Youth sports leagues are a $37.5B industry in the US. They are heavily underserved in financial services.

Players Health and Thread Bank partnered to launch a custom digital experience offering specialized SMB banking + lending + insurance.

Scope

UX design
Full-stack development for:

  • SMB account opening
  • Digital banking
  • Corporate card management + sub-ledger
  • BNPL purchases
  • BaaS, card issuing + data provider integrations
  • QA, DevOps, and compliance support
Results
  • <6 month launch
  • 50+ SMBS onboarded in beta
  • $600K ARR onboarded in week 1
  • $30M Series B funding secured

The challenges

Fraud

Limited governance over funds often results in misuse that can be hard to track.

Upfront Expenses

Teams must pay for equipment and facilities often before player dues are paid.

Fluctuating balances

Seasonal cash flow often limits their ability to access capital.

Accounting

Tax, accounting, and board reporting is time-consuming and complex.

Multiple users

There are multiple teams per organization, each with coaches + admins requiring access to funds.

Vision: Players Health Finance

Pre-season advances and lending

To start the season with all of the equipment needed.

Mobile banking and debit cards

To easily issue virtual and physical cards to teams and coaches.

Accounting, tax reporting, and compliance

To compare accountants and find the best fit for reporting needs.

Complete financial oversight and governance

To guide the organization in financial opportunities

Store deposits securely from anywhere

To easily issue virtual and physical cards to teams and coaches.

Distribute funds across sub-accounts

To easily issue virtual and physical cards to teams and coaches.

Governance and oversight for reporting and compliance

Provide the board of directors with the proper governance and oversight for reporting and compliance

Transaction notifications

Stay up-to-date with the org’s cash flow with transaction notifications

SMB account opening

Account Opening feature, informed by user research, customizes the digital banking experience to suit each user’s organizational structure. This tailored approach, guided by extensive insights, ensures the platform caters precisely to individual needs.

A key element is the goal-gradient effect, where users input sport-specific details. This assists expense planning and empowers efficient team budget management, offering a personalized and streamlined financial solution.

Account onboarding + funding

Immediate account funding ensures maximum deposit capture, fostering continuous account engagement and swift benefit realization. Proactive reminders about account benefits significantly boost conversion rates by highlighting the advantages, encouraging informed decisions, and contributing to a higher rate of successful account openings.

Card Issuing integration:

Sub-account structures

Organizations can now separate team funds, transactions, and accounting through compliantly-created accounts ledger on the core.

A truly digital banking experience

A custom digital experience enabled Players Health to cross-sell banking, lending, insurance, and risk services.

Seamless card issuing, transactions, and accounting tags

The accounting process is optimized by tagging transactions and payments during processing to boost efficiency and simplify accounting procedures and tax reporting.

Players Health can efficiently issue virtual and physical cards to organization members to enhance accessibility and control, enabling organizations to promptly and effectively adapt to their members’ needs.

BNPL and seasonal lending

Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) enables the upfront acquisition of sports equipment and facilities before registration fees are received. This strategic initiative efficiently addresses upfront expenses and generates an extra revenue stream for both Players Health and Thread Bank.

By deeply understanding their customers and the seasonal nature of their cash flow, Players Health and Thread Bank can better underwrite risk and offer loans at better rates than competitors.

Internal + external transfers

The guided onboarding process facilitates seamless bill payments and significantly enhances user stickiness. The approach ensures users are efficiently onboarded and engaged, fostering a lasting connection with the platform.

The platform also enables hassle-free transfers, both to external accounts and sub-accounts. This not only streamlines financial transactions but also contributes to a user-friendly experience.

Compelling landing pages

Through user research, Praxent identified the critical challenges faced by sports organization administrators. The insight was instrumental in refining Player’s Health landing pages to showcase their platform’s advantages compared to undifferentiated competitor accounts and effectively communicate their unique value proposition.

Why Praxent

A partner from end to end

Technical Design Workshops

Existing MVP prototype architecture, non-functional goals, and potential architecture patterns.

Vendor Selection + Technical Design

Key technology selections and cloud deployment approach.

UX Design

User flow diagrams and wireframes representing a landing page concept and design review for the PH 3.0 platform.

V1 Feature Prioritization and MVP Agile Dev

Comprehensive feature list for first product release.

Launch

In less than 6 months, enabling the onboarding of 50 SMBs at launch.

Strategic Value Engineering:


Double quotes

To meet our client’s goal of launching before the upcoming sports season, we faced a tight 5-month deadline.

We used lean methodology to focus on essential early-stage features, achieving an MVP within the timeline. The product is designed for iterative evolution, based on real user feedback.

Himani Nath Principal Delivery Lead, Praxent

14+ years of experience in financial services.
Payments specialist.

Previous experience:

Strategic and large-scale finance initiatives lead at PayFlex

Strategic Value Engineering:


Double quotes

When we kicked off our engagement, Players Health had a handful of designs from an agency that they’d worked with previously.

Unfortunately, these designs didn’t fully match the vision that the client had, so we focused on prioritizing specific features and re-designed the product to align with their goal.

Kara Konop Senior Product Designer, Praxent

9+ years of experience in human-centered UX / UI design.
BNPL specialist.

Previous experience:

CitiBank’s BNPL experience 
Home Depot’s commercial credit card application

<6

Month launch

$30M

Series B funding

50+

SMBs onboarded in beta

5

Fintech provider integrations

Compliance-approved accounts ledger on Thread Bank’s core

What Players Health had to say

Tyrre Burks

Tyrre Burks

CEO Players Health


Double quotes

Within less than half a year, we built an application that could onboard and start helping nearly 50 clubs. As we plan our broader rollout plan, we’re excited to keep the momentum going to help more organizations get access to a banking solution that makes sense for them