Cheat Code to Increase Conversion 10x

A Home Entry That Dramatically Increases Traffic

What kind of initial entry rate do most new features show? 10%? 5%? 1%? It varies by product, but unless it's a core product feature, most features will fall within the 0.1% to 0.5% range. In this case, increasing the entry rate has a much larger impact from a full-funnel perspective than the conversion rate relative to entry, so we need improvements that widen the entry point.

Relocating a specific feature to increase its entry rate is one approach, but this can cause significant side effects like cognitive dissonance, so it must be approached carefully. (However, there was a case where we improved it 10x without cognitive dissonance — Increasing Free Trials 10x by Adjusting Feature Placement) Another strategy to increase entry rate besides relocating is an entry strategy. It's about creating a shortcut that lands directly on that feature. The entry strategy can also be divided into two types
(Previous post — Funnel Optimization Strategy)

Home Entry

A Blunt But Exposure-Maximizing Entry

This is about heavily promoting the feature right on the product's home screen. You've probably seen screens like the ones below in various apps. A space that doesn't feel like an ad, but rather looks like a native component within the app, which lands on a specific feature when tapped—and strangely, its content changes every time, focusing exactly on what I need.

Honestly, when I first saw these kinds of spaces, from a solution perspective, I just thought, "Of course they need to let users know when something new is launched, so they use these areas." However, through a few experiences, I realized that utilizing this space is a winning strategy that can massively amplify conversion.

After launching the Invite Friends feature, we noticed the entry rate was far too low, so we decided to create an entry at the top of the product's main screen. We didn't overcomplicate the product spec; we just quickly built and deployed it so that it would only be shown to users who had never visited the feature. The results were astounding.

As it was exposed to all users right after launch, the number of users funneling into Invite Friends (= the final conversion metric for Invite Friends) skyrocketed by 5x. The traffic from existing users temporarily contributed heavily to this impact, and after that initial effect wore off, from a growth perspective, it was analyzed to have grown by 3x.

During this process, we also tasted the exact opposite experience, which allowed us to double-check the effectiveness of the home entry.

While adding the Invite Friends entry, the Wake-up Challenge entry disappeared, which led to a massive drop in funnel conversion for the Wake-up Challenge. (The Wake-up Challenge had launched with a home entry from the very beginning.) Calculating backward from this, we estimated that the entry had contributed to roughly a 3x conversion bump there as well.

3x is Just the Beginning

You might think, "What the... you used the top area of the home screen and only got 3x?" But 3x is just the beginning. As mentioned earlier, we didn't approach the home entry strategically. We just added it because we wanted to announce the launch of a new feature. Therefore, from a growth perspective, there were a few weakly implemented points.

• [Target Users] Blanket exposure to an unspecified majority: We didn't target and show it to a user segment likely to need the specific feature. As targeting gets more sophisticated, the impact of the home entry will grow even larger. User satisfaction will go up, too.

• [UI/UX] Could look like an ad: We didn't try very hard to make it not look like an ad. Since it was a space that would disappear once visited anyway, we actually designed the draft to stand out more. If we provide a more natural UI/UX, user engagement will improve, leading to an even bigger impact.

• [Post-exposure Behavior] Simple action: There was no interaction like sequentially rolling entries for various features, or allowing users to swipe. It was just a space that disappeared when touched. We can redesign the post-exposure behavior to drive better engagement.

For the above reasons, the percentage of users who tried touching our top home entry was less than 3% of total users. Despite that, it nearly tripled the number of conversions. What if we could increase the home entry engagement rate to 10%? That's the path where 3x could become 10x.

And so, we decided to actively utilize the home entry area in earnest from a funnel growth perspective.

As this will be an experience of diving much deeper into the home screen entry strategy from a growth angle, I'm expecting detailed lessons to pour out. I look forward not only to a 10x improvement on a specific feature level, but also to various unexpected synergies (like an xx% increase in new user app retention).

If anyone has experience or knowledge related to this, please share! :D