🇮🇩 3 lessons from Gojek's onboarding flow
A closer look at Gojek's user onboarding strategy
Gojek was founded in 2010 as a ride-hailing service in Indonesia 🇮🇩 , a country known for its traffic congestion and lack of efficient public transportation. The company quickly gained popularity, and in 2015 it expanded its services to include food delivery, which became a hit with consumers. Since then, Gojek has continued to innovate and expand, offering services such as e-commerce, grocery delivery, banking services and so on.
One of the reasons for Gojek's success is its ability to understand and address the unique needs of Indonesian consumers. For example, its digital payments platform, GoPay, has also become increasingly popular in Indonesia, where many people do not have access to traditional banking services.
A few weeks back, I recently examined Gojek through the lens of a Product Marketer 🕵️ and identified 3 valuable insights to share with you.
Hi everyone, thanks for coming back to bowl of tech 🍜 where each month, I humbly break down the growth strategy and product experience of the top mobile apps in Asia.
In this May's post, the focus is on Gojek - the super app in Indonesia - listing down 3 takeaways from their onboarding flow.
#1 - Onboarding carousel - good or bad?
An onboarding carousel is a mobile app design element that guides new users through various features, providing an easy way to access and learn about all the app's capabilities. It's essentially a series of screens that walk new and existing users through how to use different features.
Wins 🙌
Using a carousel in your app's onboarding process can be a highly effective strategy, especially if your app boasts numerous features that may be unfamiliar to new users. For instance, Gojek leverages a carousel to showcase their most popular services, ranked by user engagement data.
But for existing users, Gojek takes it one step further by using personalisation tactics. For example, if a user has previously used ride-hailing services, the onboarding carousel may emphasise that feature. By analysing data and user preferences, the onboarding process can be tailored to each individual user, promoting services and features that are relevant to their needs.
➡️ With clear guidance and detailed explanations, an onboarding carousel can help new users feel at ease and confident when navigating the app.
Learns 🤷♀️
6 is a number of screens used in Gojek’s carousel. While six screens may seem like a comprehensive introduction to the app's features, it can be overwhelming for new users.
If the onboarding process is too lengthy or complicated, users may skip it altogether, leading to a negative impact on:
Time to first use - the amount of time it takes for a new user to start using the app.
Conversion rate - the percentage of users who complete a specific action (such as signing up for a subscription or making a purchase).
User retention - the percentage of users who continue to use the app over time.
When users engage with your product, they naturally filter out information. This is because the human brain seeks to minimise the amount of mental effort required to complete a task, and therefore prioritises only the most relevant information.
➡️ Prioritise the most valuable information to ensure a smooth onboarding experience to help new users feel more comfortable and confident using the app.
#2 - Optimising User Permissions
During the onboarding process, Gojek requests various user permissions, such as access to the user's mobile phone number or location. These permissions are necessary for the app's functionality, as they allow Gojek to provide personalised and location-based services to its users.
Wins 🙌
Requesting user permissions is a widely used strategy by many mobile apps, especially those that require access to location or personal data to provide services. By being transparent about the reasons and methods for requesting permissions upfront, Gojek is delivering a personalised experience to its users seamlessly and without causing any friction.
Moreover, Gojek's in-app notification timing for requesting mobile phone numbers is perfect, as users are more likely to interact with prompts that are consistent with their previous actions.
➡️ Be transparent when requesting user permissions upfront and strategically time and place in-app prompts to increase user engagement.
Learns 🤷♀️
However, some users may be hesitant to grant certain permissions, particularly if they are concerned about their privacy. In the case of Gojek's location request without context, this could lead to user frustration.
I believe that Gojek should provide more information on how user data will be used and offer clear opt-out options to users who are hesitant to grant certain permissions to ensure transparency and respect for privacy.
➡️ Provide opt-out options to help ease user concerns
#3- Visuals vs. Text: Finding the Right Balance
Gojek provides visual aids to guide users through each step of the onboarding process.
Wins 🙌
By breaking down the onboarding process into smaller, more manageable steps, Gojek reduces the likelihood of users feeling overwhelmed. The use of visual aids to effectively educate on how to use the app while reducing the likelihood of user error.
➡️ Visuals are key during an onboarding process because they can convey information more quickly and effectively than text alone. Humans are highly visual creatures and we process visual information faster and more efficiently than text.
Learns 🤷♀️
While detailed instructions and visual aids can be helpful for many users, some may find them time-consuming or overwhelming. It's important to strike a balance between providing enough guidance for new users and not burdening them with too much information.
➡️ To achieve this balance, focus on introducing the core features of the product during the onboarding process, and gradually introduce more advanced options as users become more familiar with the interface. This approach helps keep the interface simple and accessible for new users, while empowering advanced users to take advantage of more complex features over time.
That's all for now. See you next month !
Allison
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In case you missed it: last month, I wrote about ↓
