User Onboarding
useronboard.com
useronboard.com
- There's no call to action at all
- Assuming someone who lands here would have some idea of what user onboarding is, the page doesn't say specifically how this will help me get better at it. Just gives me a definition which I (probably) already know.
- Mentioning brands I recognise (Spotify, Pocket, Pinterest) is good. Makes me curious to know more. But I'm not sure exactly what a teardown is.
- Ahhh, so there's a book that I'll like if I enjoyed the teardowns. I guess I'll look at a teardown and then maybe I'll look at the book afterwards.
- Once on a teardown page (eg. http://www.useronboard.com/how-shopify-onboards-new-users/) there's nothing mentioning the book at all.
- I am now addicted to teardowns and have forgotten about the book. The Training & Contact links at the top do not get my attention. Which is a shame because I think https://www.useronboard.com/training/ does a pretty good job overall.
- Completely ignored the Latest Posts bit at the bottom of the homepage. Looks very similar to the Less Accounting one (http://www.useronboard.com/how-lessaccounting-onboards-new-u...)
Maybe it's not actually trying to sell very hard the book and I'm over thinking it a bit, but I did find it interesting to try and apply what I'd just learned.
That said, the fact that it skews educational over salesy is very intentional -- I'd much rather have you find it to be a phenomenal resource and come back over and over (and then buy the book) than I would have it try to sell you hard on the first visit, which is probably unlikely to be optimal timing. To that point, I didn't see you mention signing up for the mailing list or not, but if you did, it's "working" as intended for visit one!
But yeah, overall, you're quite right to turn my own advice back on me!
I think it's a mistake to avoid being salesy. People who want to improve their conversions (presumably your targeted customers) want solutions that your book or mailing list very well might solve. In fact it wasn't until I read the OP's comment that I realized you had a mailing list or training materials to sell.
One suggestion would be to put a WP-style banner at the top asking people to sign up for your mailing list. It isn't overbearing and if people aren't interested, they won't sign up.
Anyhow, not trying to sound condescending, just offering some advice that I think could be helpful.
It's a blog, not an app, so that doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
There's a giant blue button that says Check out the Book
But getting people to buy the book might not be the primary goal of the website, or the home page. It's probably to show off the reviews and teardowns, which it does a great job of. I think it's perfectly acceptable to have the secondary purpose of the site, buying the book, a bit out of the way.
The article page linked to from HN is "http://www.useronboard.com/onboarding-teardowns/", which has zero calls to action on it natively. If I go back to home, yes, I see the button, below the fold, presumably it exists on other pages as well, but it is definitely not on the linked page, which had me questioning why I couldn't find it (and spending an inordinately long time looking for it).
NB Really good job - I found this quite fascinating.
For instance, a lot of the buttons on these screens are very extremely pushed to the side when they're in the corners. Look at the Shopify one specifically.
And while yes, some users will have screens that huge and designers will have to deal with that edge case, I feel it's too atypical to use for a typical user's experience.
I mean even if the website is really interesting, the book is $50 minimum.
This is a great example of something most people can do to boost their earning potential, even (especially) as an employee. As an aid to selling ebooks & training, the benefit is obvious (it's on HN). But, something like this would also make sense to anyone working on UX.
It's at least as valuable as an acronym on your CV.
Patrick seems to be advocating making your everyday work public, repeatable and enduring. That's ideal. But, for people that are working in a silo or otherwise not going to take that step, this seems like an accessible step.
In fact, a carbon copy of this seems like a good template for a UX person to follow. Pick a topic (not on boarding). Do the research. Make a dozen examples easily digestible for someone who needs to implement the thing you are researching. In-app notifications, advanced settings, in-app tips (Clippy!), profile pages, email drip marketing, commenting systems, badges, profile pages…. Almost any UX topic could use teardowns like this.
1. Illustration of smiling high confidence person draws you in.
2. The illustration feels a bit flat and 'uncanny-valley-ish.' it leaves an
impersonal impression, but that might be the intent (i.e. you get the
personal stuff when you log in)
You think so? I have mixed feelings about this.
I think designers tend to overload commercial websites with cheesy smiling faces.
Maybe if they could come up with some more creative idea for positive imagery instead... but happy people, perhaps it's actually good that they didn't resort to this cliche again (since - as you pointed out - they already showed us a bunch of people mysteriously smiling at the menu screen like some drugged Joker victims ;) )
p.s. "drugged Joker victims" is a hilarious way to describe it!
Full of useful tips and tricks. I highly recommend it.
Maybe they've reached a point where they feel they are the market leader now and assume that anyone hitting their site already knows they're good and just wants to get straight in to a free trial?