Behind The Experience

In this episode, we’re joined by Jane Portman, the CEO and Co-Founder of Userlist. An email marketing and customer engagement platform built with B2B SaaS features in mind. Jane shares her favorite UX examples and integrations that made Userlist ten times more potent in onboarding, engagement, nurturing customers, and marketing leads.

Quotes from this episode

"When we were designing our onboarding flow, we wanted to create a commitment experience. For us, that's leading the user to entering their credit card details.”

"We don't have a hard time on manual sales, so collecting information during the signup is a powerful thing because it helps users self-diagnose what they're going to do with the tool."

"As a UX person, I'm a big proponent of empty states versus violent things that get in front of you. We want to encourage the organic app experience."

Show Notes

[1:30] How did they come to define onboarding at Userlist?

[2:11] What made them decide to broaden their category rather than niching down?

[6:54] What are other ways to get people into that commitment mindset?

[13:14] Going over Userlist’s website interface and the journey of how they come up with their design flow

[21:38] Jane explains how they wanted their design to be more on the organic app experience side

[24:56] Not all integrations are seen as equal

[26:39] Jane explains the performance of their API integration

[27:48] What are some exciting things that UserList is looking forward to achieving?

About Jane Portman

Jane Portman is a UI/UX consultant specializing in web application design and the founder of UI Breakfast and Userlist. At Userlist, Jane aims to provide flawless UX and help users improve their customer messaging. Jane has also been running UI Breakfast Podcast since 2014.

Dan helps AWeber in the design aspect, as he leads his team to create simple user interfaces and workflows to accomplish the complexities of email marketing automation tasks. In this episode, he gives us a rundown of their product and design strategy while enumerating some of the metrics they follow to track their performance.

Quotes from this episode

"We see that there's quite a big hump over there sending that first email and after that, it seems to be much easier. We have success for our customers tied to that metric."

"We all work together. We evolve and develop a design system for all users across the app. So we work very closely together but still focus on these individual areas."

Show Notes

[1:39] What does success look like for new users at AWeber?

[4:35] What kind of metrics are they looking at?

[7:08] What role does Dan play from a team perspective?

[9:41] Dan explains their holistic approach toward developing new features

[12:54] The key to putting their systems in place is having close communication between departments

[13:28] Dan gives us a walk through AWeber's UI

[17:10] It’s important to keep the audience fresh by constantly communicating with them

[22:13] Don't get disappointed about the rates of your checklist completion, especially when you're just starting, because you have a lot to learn

[22:43] “You are often not the target that you are trying to reach”

[25:29] What tweaks and experiments are they looking forward to trying out next?

About Daniel Hanawalt

Dan has had quite an experience working with high-performing companies in the field of Email Marketing Automation, Life Sciences, and Master Data Management. His career is focused on UX leadership and strategy as he implements some of his background in various design principles, which includes UI and UX design for web, mobile apps, video, and print. Today, he's been spearheading AWeber in achieving its business objectives.

Today, Kris will give us a walkthrough of Thinkific’s onboarding process and the journey of how they’ve become the best support for their users. Kris also shares some tactics they implemented to amplify their users' engagement. At the end of this episode, he also spoils some exciting experiments that Thinkific is looking forward to launching.

Quotes from this episode

"Segment your customers based on where they're at and develop communications that actually help them accomplish jobs-to-be-done. That's how you improve activation."

"Building a customer journey map has been critical to understanding and improving our activation experience."

"We offer a checklist that gives some structure in terms of what you can do first, second, and third. But, it doesn't force you to do anything in any linear path."

Show Notes

[2:59] How do they define success for new users at Thinkific?

[7:40] Speaking to their customers and understanding their journey is a significant part of Thinkific’s onboarding process

[8:28] Onboarding success is not about getting to that “aha” moment. It’s about building a habit

[12:54] How does Kris work with other teams to jumpstart their onboarding experience?

[17:38] Kris talks about Thinkific’s website interface and how their checklist work

[21:43] How Thinkific uses videos to amplify their user’s engagement?

[26:59] Thinkific aids in guiding their users on how to accomplish their goals and give them more clarity in their journey toward success

[34:45] Kris shares some of the experiments that they’re looking forward to launching

About Kris Chichak

Kris is an expert in working in fast-paced environments. His exceptional professionalism and dedication to his work are his assets in propelling him forward to success. His strong sense of leadership and altruism makes him stand out in the business world.

Imagine signing up for a product, and the last screen of the onboarding experience asks you to install a tracking code to your app. If you're not a developer, you'll likely leave and never come back! That's one of the challenges for Hotjar, a platform that gives people insight into their users' behavior. In this episode, Alessio Laiso, Senior Product Designer at Hotjar, shares:

• An overview of identifying Hotjar users' personas
• Some critical indicators on how they can drive toward user engagement
• How Hotar empowers product teams to empathize with their users while bringing personalisation and guidance.

Quotes from this Episode

"Hotjar strikes that balance, helping users achieve their goals but not driving them crazy."

"We look at those users that are the most engaged and understand what those actions are that they take and how they can replicate those actions."

Show Notes

[2:26] What does "success" mean for new users at HotJar?

[4:22] What are some indicators that they use to know if somebody ends up purchasing from HotJar?

[7:47] Alessio shares his own experience of using HotJar.

[13: 42] Alessio gives us a walkthrough of HotJar’s interface.

[24: 33] A lot of times, users want to see your product on screen. It gives your site more functionality.

[31: 39] The checklist at HotJar adapts to the options that people or new users choose as a sign-up flow.

[32:12] What is the next big thing for HotJar?

About Alessio Laiso

Alessio have led user-centred design work to build award-winning software and experiences enjoyed by people across the globe. He is also a well-known Graphics Designer and has been designing typefaces since 2013. His fonts have been used by brands like eBay, Amazon, USA Today, and are available on Google Fonts.

She’s here today to dive deeply into how MURAL creates the best-in-class digital customer experience for its new users. Lauren also tapped into how MURAL seeks meaningful collaborative sessions where people can create content—bringing up how their team works together to strive and deliver a seamless user experience effortlessly.

Quotes from this episode

“Mural is all about that collaboration that involves multiple people and them coming together to have that moment of collaboration.”

“In onboarding, we're trying to teach you both how to use this piece of software, but we're also educating you on use cases.”

Show Notes

[1:33] What does success look like for new users at MURAL?

[3:33] MURAL is all about that Collaboration that involves multiple people and them coming together to have that moment of Collaboration

[5:40] What are some of the metrics they look at to ensure that things are working well in their onboarding process?

[6:29] The methodology of breaking individual metrics into more extensive metrics

[7:47] Collaboration happens at a team level rather than an individual level

[9:20] How do they work with other teams to deliver a seamless experience for new users?

[11:30] The core of the product is often an essential part of getting activation

[16:24] A walkthrough of MURAL’s interactive UI

[18:17] MURAL allows different options for people to learn in the way that they like to learn

About Lauren Schuman

Lauren has 15+ years of a track record in delivering results to grow businesses of all sizes. She always believes that "what" you deliver is just as important as the "how." She works tirelessly at becoming a daring leader who leads with vulnerability, empathy, and alignment with a set of values.