New Product Tour + Onboarding
Cut time to first campaign by 6 days
TapOnIt is an SMS marketing platform that helps businesses reach their customers through campaigns. While signups were strong, many new clients struggled to move beyond creating an account.
Problem
Unclear setup steps delayed, or hindered, new clients from sending their first campaign.
Focus
Guide users through only what’s needed to confidently launch a campaign.
Result
Step-by-step onboarding that reduced the average time to first campaign.
Company
TapOnIt, an SMS marketing startup
Role
Solo Product Designer
Team
CEO, Eng (2), Support (2), & Marketing Director
Timeline
~ 5 weeks
New users were getting stuck during onboarding, but why??
After sign-up, many clients hesitated. They weren't sure which steps to take first or whether their setup met SMS compliance requirements.
As a result, Customer Support received tickets with common concerns, and many clients didn't return to the platform until encouraged by Support. This confusion delayed clients from sending their first campaign, the company's primary source of revenue.
Users needed clear next steps after signup
Based on feedback from Support, I explored different ways to guide users through setup and to discover what was being offered. Displaying a checklist stood out as a way to highlight what mattered, list the next best action, and empower clients to continue by showing visible progress.
My first attempt had too much friction
Initially, the checklist included feature explanations and locked steps tied to upgrading. I attempted to use the checklist to upsell memberships, but this added cognitive load and turned the experience into what seemed like a never-ending list of tasks.
Before
After
I took a step back to revisit the goal
During critique, it became clear that the problem was not usability, but focus. In trying to do too much at once, the experience had gotten distracting.
That conversation helped the team realign around what mattered most for the moment and that was giving new clients a clear path to a setup ready for campaign launch.
A more focused guide would help users move forward
With insights from our team discussions, I redesigned the checklist to focus on the six essential steps required to launch a first campaign.
In the revised version, I:
● Removed unnecessary explanation text
● Made tasks more action-based
● Made progress feel achievable
Not Started
1st Step Completed
I paired the checklist with a simple product tour that appeared immediately after a client entered their dashboard.
I made a pivot to test things faster
Early onboarding flow created using Userflow
To start testing with users sooner, I shifted from a fully custom onboarding build to using an onboarding tool called Userflow. Although it came with some design limitations, I was able to test the experience directly in the platform and make changes very quickly, while allowing Engineering to focus on other priorities.
Within a week, the onboarding flow was live in the dashboard and being tested with users.
This resulted in faster setup and stronger engagement
The amount of time that it usually took to launch the first campaign
dropped by 6 days.
● 2 out of 3 new clients completed the tour
● More than half of new users returned to the platform within their 1st week
There's still room to expand and personalize onboarding
If I continued to focus on this project, I would:
● Further customize onboarding based on client type, industry & use case
● Install behavior-based triggers to introduce advanced features as clients use the platform more