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In the previous blog, we talked about moving anonymous users through to a known state. By leveraging the data we know in an anonymous state, we can make a personalised experience and test different routes to conversion - the conversion being the registration of a user in this conversation.
There are ways to make this ‘registered’ state easier to come by. The first is a simple one, ensure that the amount of information you’re requesting is minimal. This removes friction in the registration process. What data will a user give me as an exchange to access said page or product. This is key to ensuring that you get the maximum number of registrations and increasing conversions rates without users dropping out of the funnel.
A simple registration form could include just an email address and password. We can then sync this back to the session ID and ensure we have the person converted to a first party relationship.
Leveraging Social
Another way we can make this process simple is by leveraging social login. Social login is a way of using existing login information or credentials used from a service such as Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft or Twitter to sign into a website, without creating a new account specifically for that website. This is another way of removing friction, everyone knows their Facebook login already, right? Most probably saved into your phone or via your ‘FaceID’ or something like that?
A couple of benefits for implementing a social login approach is that you can potentially speed up the login process (unless you’re like me and USELESS with passwords!) but also you have a pre-validated email, so removes the need to get email validation - which of course is needed to prevent fabricated emails being entered!
“Passwordless” Login
There are lots of other ways in which we can make this process quicker, ensuring a frictionless experience. I’m assuming most of you have experienced a ‘passwordless’ authentication/login? Most notably the login experience leveraged by Slack and Monzo? Passwordless authentication makes passwords obsolete, leveraging a magic link, fingerprint or token that’s delivered by email or text to login. Again, all removing friction in this process to enable easy access and continual login.
But, how can we move these customers from Known to Customer? Essentially, we want them to subscribe to a product, but what product is right? What’s the best experience to get them to convert? How can I ensure they’re qualified enough?
Progressive Profiling
This is where progressive profiling comes into play. Progressive profiling is a technique that enables companies, brands and marketers to gradulary collect more granular information on their users and consumers. This is typically done at strategic intervals throughout the conversion journey. Again, probably via some kind of value exchange. By leveraging data capture forms which request a few pieces of information at a time, in exchange for access to a product, service or information. By introducing this kind of process it enables you to build a bigger and more complete picture of your user, getting a very granular first party dataset.
From here, we can then segment, target and personalize the experience for all users. The outcome of this process is a tailored approach to subscription. This leads to better conversion (shorter forms needed, therefore typically higher conversion rates), improved customer experience (fewer questions needed to access the product, service or information they’re interested in) and improved customer interactions (more touchpoints, more information, more buyer intent).
Again though, one size doesn’t fit all. Despite doing all of the above, you still need to build and test different types of forms for buying said product of subscription. Maybe having monthly pricing converts higher than annual? Maybe the amount of data needed in the payment process is impeding conversion rates? A fast and agile testing strategy is key to ensuring maximum revenue and conversion.
In summary, moving known and registered users to become customers is a challenge all on its own. Leveraging progressive profiling and data capture gives you the best possible chance of understanding more about your users and getting a very granular picture. This all enables you to personalize your experience and drive users down the right path to conversion.
In part 3, we’re going to talk about how, once your users are subscribed and customers, there are still different sub-user states to look into, including Active, Inactive, Renewal and Churn.
