Bitly
Bitly, along with QR Code Generator, offer a connections platform that incorporates URL shortening, link management and QR Code generation.
QRCG
Content audit
Issue
The QR Code Generator product had been around for many years, and had been built by different teams at different times. The content was inconsistent and unoptimised.
To do
Conduct a content audit of the QR Code Generator product.
Research
I began by establishing goals for the project. Bitly wanted to optimise the QRCG product, but to what ends? I reviewed the scattered and unfinished style guides to see how the product should be made consistent. I read the product / engineering strategy, the product roadmap, and existing user research, and collected all the user feedback I could get my hands on. Finally, I set up interviews with stakeholders to take advantage of their knowledge and experience.
With all of this research in hand, I was able to identify pain points and opportunities for improvement with QRCG. I used these to establish a set of goals to help focus the content audit.
Goals
Enhance the user experience
The product strategy called on us to “enhance the user experience to positively impact conversion, free trial signups, and retention.”
Make content consistent
The content had become inconsistent as the product had grown and evolved, and needed to be standardised. For example, the CTAs were inconsistent.
Correct errors
There were some instances of text not showing properly. There were also instances of broken content or incorrect or missing information.
Improve accessibility
Take advantage of “Aha moments”
2. Reduce deceptive designs
Make trial terms clear
Users would initially sign up for a 14-day free trial, after which the QR Codes they’d created may stop working unless they bought a subscription.
UX Research compiled feedback from users who gave the product a negative satisfaction score into a wordcloud:
Words such as free, plan, pay, expensive, monthly, year and trial were the most mentioned. These words convey a message that customers were not aware that they had to pay for a yearly subscription to keep the QR Code active past the trial period. They also thought that the prices were expensive in order to keep their QR Codes working.
In additional testing, 43% of participants did not realise at all that they signed up for a 14-day free trial, and 13.3% suggested that the information about the free trial should be clearer or more prominent. It was evident that a significant number of participants were caught off guard by the free trial. Those who realised that they were trialling a product noticed after they signed up and wished they were warned about the terms of the trial earlier in the journey.
3: Encourage users to upgrade to a paid plan
Only 2.33% of free trial users upgraded to a paid plan.
Emphasise product value
Research found that 22% of users who would promote the Starter Plan appreciated the ability to customise the design and add custom logo. 25% of renewing Professional Plan users did the same, along with 13% of active Free Trial users. 14% of Advanced Plan promoters appreciated the scan analytics. When interviewing Starters, we found that out of 8 participants, only 3 knew they could redirect their Dynamic QR Codes. Signup discovery research also found that scan statistics went unnoticed in the free generator and the app, but the participants acknowledged the value that they can bring.
The numbers varied from study to study, but a consistent theme that emerged was a surprisingly low number of users being interested in QRCG’s various features, or even noticing them at all.
Content audit
For the audit, I broke the product experience down into different sections: Initial discovery, Signup, QR Code generation, Dashboard, Details, Trial ending, and Miscellaneous. I catalogued copy by type (Product copy, Empty state, Hover state, Error message, etc). For each piece of content, I shared my exploratory notes and recommendations on copy and design. Recommendations were catalogued by which of the goals they’d help to tackle.
I produced a series of presentations based on the findings of the audit: