There was a small startup helping schools print yearbooks, called Canva.
And then there was Adobe, the undisputed king of design software, at the time.
Canva went after a different market - people who didn’t know how to design. But that left them with a big product problem.
Users were pretty uncomfortable using a design tool when they knew they were no good at design.
Early on, the team uncovered their most important insight.
A few clicks was all that stood in the way of a new user from becoming a regular user. This is all it took for a user to realise how easy Canva is to use.
The problem was - few users were clicking at all. Faced by a big blank white slate, they were frozen by a lack of confidence. Holding them back was a fear of making a ‘mistake’ or creating something unsightly.
So Canva came up with a genius way to break the deadlock.
They simply asked users to start their design by dragging an image of a monkey onto the design canvas.
It was super easy, had a light touch of humour and wasn’t too serious. It puts a smile on your face. It was the perfect way to tear down a user’s reservations.
As a result, according to co-founder Cameron Adams, they saw a massive increase in the percentage of users who regularly used Canva.
Why does this work so well? Smiling releases dopamine - making you feel happier and serotonin - making you feel less stressed.
Pretty good strategy if you ask me.
Early on, the team uncovered their most important insight.
A few clicks was all that stood in the way of a new user from becoming a regular user. This is all it took for a user to realise how easy Canva is to use.
The problem was - few users were clicking at all. Faced by a big blank white slate, they were frozen by a lack of confidence. Holding them back was a fear of making a ‘mistake’ or creating something unsightly.
So Canva came up with a genius way to break the deadlock.
They simply asked users to start their design by dragging an image of a monkey onto the design canvas.
It was super easy, had a light touch of humour and wasn’t too serious. It puts a smile on your face. It was the perfect way to tear down a user’s reservations.
As a result, according to co-founder Cameron Adams, they saw a massive increase in the percentage of users who regularly used Canva.
Why does this work so well? Smiling releases dopamine - making you feel happier and serotonin - making you feel less stressed.
Pretty good strategy if you ask me.
How can you create shortcuts to decrease the time to value for your users? Even if that value isn’t the exact end value your users are looking for?
At the end of the day if you can put a smile on your users’ face they’ll probably come back.
Such a creative way to increase onboarding conversion rates, and it’s cool that it’s backed up by neuroscience too.
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