Onboarding: "the experience a customer has when they become oriented to a product or service." Experiences included in the Onboarding phase could be a self install kit, a getting started guide, a first time user experience, or contextual help mid-use. After a few months of working on a new Onboarding experience for Comcast, I came to the conclusion that designing for this phase in the user experience is more psychological than other kinds of interface design. It's about tying into the emotional state of the user: like playing a game or having a conversation. This talk provides a core set of principles for designing Onboarding experiences that tie into this psychological approach.

1. Principles of Onboarding
Henken Bean
Sr. User Experience Designer
@henken

2. WHAT IS ONBOARDING?

3. “
It’s the experience a
customer has when they
become oriented to a
product or service.

4. ONBOARDING PHASES
decide get start use
purchase or self install or first time use. ongoing use.
commit. pro-install

5. Onboarding is psychological.
It’s having awareness of the customer’s unique
emotional state.

6. Acknowledge the relationship.
meet + greet introduction mutual relationship

7. GUIDING PRINCIPLES

8. Honesty and transparency
help build trust.

9. Get them into the game.
Engage customers before asking them to commit.

10. Be welcoming + action oriented.

11. Remind me what I paid for.
Confirm early what’s included in the service that
the customer has just acquired.

12. Confirm that it’s me.

13. One door, many gates.
Persist authentication throughout
the experience.

14. Prepare me.
Instill confidence by telling the customer
what they will need up front.

15. Make it hard
to do wrong.

16. Use smart defaults.
Create smart defaults based on
existing user data and routines.

17. Provide contextual help.
Provide hints and help while the user
is already engaged with a task.

18. Show by example.

19. Reward engagement.
Reward customers for ongoing use.

20. Onboarding is a relationship.
Keep it human.
Build naturally.
Keep it going.

21. QUESTIONS?
@henken
henken . bean @ gmail.com
henkenbean . com