User Experience and Brand Loyalty

Playful Visuals: The secret sauce of viral brands. Your customers will lose interest on your product if you communicate through dry, instructional visuals and static product presentations. But what if discovering a product felt as engaging and delightful as playing on a playground? +60,000x faster – Visuals are processed far more quickly than text. +2x more likely to be shared – Playful content spreads faster. +48% higher engagement – Gamified experiences captivate audiences. >>Your Product is an Experience<< Play evokes joy and triggers dopamine release, enhancing memory, motivation, and emotional connection. When beauty products are presented in a fun and interactive way, they transform from simple cosmetics into immersive self-care rituals. Imagine a vibrant scene: a user’s hands gleefully applying a rich, textured cream, colors swirling in motion, a splash of shimmer catching the light. The product is no longer just a cosmetic; it’s an invitation to creativity, emotion, and self-expression. This visual storytelling captivates the imagination, making beauty routines feel effortless and exciting. + 23% better recall – Learning by doing beats passive learning. + 89% engagement boost – Game-like elements keep users invested. + 22 x stronger memory retention – Story-driven visuals leave lasting impressions. → Hands: The Ultimate Storytellers. Hands express personality, movement, and playfulness, making them powerful tools in beauty marketing. + Hands delicately blending makeup create a sense of artistry and skill. + A playful splash of cream on the skin conveys freedom and fun. + Interactive gestures, swiping, dabbing, or mixing, draw viewers into the experience. By showcasing hands in action, brands create an instant connection between the product and the consumer, making beauty feel tangible, inviting, and alive. + 5% retention – Of what we hear. + 10% retention – Of what we read. + 75% retention – Of what we practice. → Visual Playfulness Sparks Curiosity Don’t be afraid to infuse whimsy into your beauty visuals. + Stop-motion animations can make beauty products come to life. + Bold, colorful visuals grab attention and inspire experimentation. + Gamification, badges, challenges, interactive features, creates excitement. + Humor, memes, and quirky animations make brands feel approachable. + Community engagement through challenges, stickers, and shared content. Final thoughts. Playful visual communication isn’t just about fun, it’s a strategic tool for engagement, brand loyalty, and virality. Whether through dynamic animations, interactive design, or immersive storytelling, beauty brands that encourage customers to play, experiment, and explore are the ones that stand out. Find my curated search of examples and get inspired for your next Hit. Featured Brands: Belif BigLip From This Island Glossier Glowery Ksuu Laniege Purpur Quick beauty Rhode Sundae Vaay #beautybusiness #beautyprofessionals #beautycommunication #beautymarketing

Back when I worked on user growth @ Pinterest, I conducted 3 retention analyses that helped Pinterest grow to 450M+ MAU’s. Excited to share those analyses on Reforge Artifacts. Check it out 👇 🔗 Link to each artifact/analysis in comments. 🕹 1. Feature Retention Analysis: How can you tell when a new feature is good enough? When should you promote it? It's a question you often run into in a rapidly evolving startup. At Pinterest, we were developing an AR/VR feature called Lens. It allowed users to take pictures of objects around them and find similar pins. Before we poured time and effort on the growth team into driving users to it, we wanted to know if the feature had “product-feature fit” — i.e. were people getting value out of this feature regularly, or was it just a novelty? We benchmarked the new AR features against Pinterest features like repinning and search. We built retention curves for each feature to see if the new AR features were falling in the ballpark of other core features. In the data we saw that retention was low, people were checking it out because it was cool, but not coming back since they weren’t finding recurring use cases for it, so we made the call to not have the growth team heavily promote the feature. 📊 2. Churn Probability Analysis: In the early days of Pinterest we were developing one of our first retention emails. One of the primary questions we needed to answer was when should we intervene to try and win someone back? Our intuition was that for a really active user, you might get worried after a few days, but for a less engaged user it might be ok if they are inactive for a week or more. So we created a heatmap to show the relationship between how active a user was and how many days they had been inactive on churn probability. 🔥 To actually use the heat map, we set a cut line of 20%. We decided that when a user's churn probability hit 20%, that's when we'd send a notification or email to try to re-engage them. 📵 3. Cost of Unsubscribe Analysis: Notifications are a core lever to driving retention for many products. A couple years into scaling Pinterest’s email program, the team was sending a dozen types of emails. We wanted to understand how unsubscribing impacted user retention. We needed to get some sort of feel for the cost associated with an unsubscribe to help us understand how many emails were too much. So we did a analysis to look at correlations between someone unsubscribing and their longer-term retention after that action. 🤯 We were really surprised to see that unsubscribes had a pronounced increase in churn propensity for our core and casual users, but virtually no impact on churn for dormant, new, and resurrected users.  Our key takeaway was that we should be more sensitive about email volume with our core and casual users. Check out the full analysis at the link in the comments. ⬇

6 out of 10 brands I audit struggle to convert visitors. At best, achieving a 1% conversion rate. The culprit? - templated product pages - benefits not highlighted - not-so-intuitive design Making the shopping experience forgetful. A memorable experience is key to converting visitors.  Especially if you drive traffic to product pages. Because when someone is viewing your product, they are likely seeing other brands too. In this example, using Hawaii Coffee's PDP, I've made changes that make the shopping experience memorable and increase the conversion rate. Below are the 8 changes I recommend - 1. Adding a short product description. This should show the brand's personality and tell the shopper something valuable about the product. 2. Using an image that catches attention. This is key. Use an image that represents your brand's personality. 3. Highlighting key selling points of the product. These should be placed before the add-on cart and should be easy to read. 4. Making sure the options are clear. If you're selling different variants or sizes, make sure the user knows which one's best for them. Make this super clear. 5. Highlighting why someone should subscribe and not just purchase one time. Basically, your subscription USPs. Making the above changes gave me more space to: 6. Add a short description that builds trust in the brand and product. Especially for new visitors who are not familiar with you. 7. Add FAQs. These are essential for any product (other than fashion, probably). They are great for SEO and answering all shopper questions. 8. Add USPs with icons. These are reasons why you should trust the brand and why the product is great. Other UX changes I made: - Removed the image thumbnails - Moved price close to the product name - Added the weight next to price to show value - Added service USPs below add-to-cart CTA Found this useful? Let me know in the comments! P.S. I haven't posted on LinkedIn in a while. And it's for a good reason. I was writing my Practical Guide to CRO e-book. Which is launching next week. It includes my processes, tools, techniques – everything you need to become a pro at CRO. If you're interested, comment "e-book" and I'll personally send you a link to buy it. #conversionrateoptimization

🚨The greatest drop-off is from Product Details Page To Cart Page, so we must improve our Product Details Page! Not so fast ✋ In today's age of data obsession, almost every company has an analytics infrastructure that pumps out a tonne of numbers. But rarely do teams invest time, discipline & curiosity to interpret numbers meaningfully. I will illustrate with an example. Let's take a simple e-commerce funnel. Home Page ~ 100 users List Page ~ 90 users Product Display Page ~ 70 users Cart Page ~ 20 users Address Page ~ 15 users Payments Page ~12 users Order Confirmation Page ~ 9 users A team that just "looks" at data will immediately conclude that the drop-off is most steep between Product Details Page & Cart Page. As a consequence they will start putting in a lot of fire power into solving user problems on Product Display Page. But if the team were data "curious", would frame hypothesis such as "do certain types of users reach cart page more effectively than others?" and go on to look at users by purchase buckets, geography, category etc and look at the entire funnel end to end to observe patterns. In the above scenario, it's likely that the 20 cart users were power users whilst new & early purchasers don't make it to this stage. The reason could be poor recommendations on the list page or customers are only visiting the product display page to see a larger close up of the product. So how should one go about looking at data ? Do ✅ Start with an open & curious mind ✅ Start with hypothesis ✅ Identify metrics & counter metrics that will help prove/disprove hypothesis ✅ Identify the various dimensions that could influence behaviours - user type, geography, category, device type, gender, price point, day, time etc. The dimensions will be specific to your line of business. ✅ Check for data quality and consistency ✅ Look at upstream and downstream behaviour to see how the behaviour is influenced upstream and what happens to the behaviour downstream. ✅ Check for historical evidence of causality Dont ❌ Look at data to satisfy your bias ❌ Rush to conclude your interpretation ❌ Look at data in isolation - - - TLDR - Be curious. Not confirmed. #metrics #analytics #productmanagement #productmanager #productcraft #deepdiveswithdsk

Your blockchain users aren't loyal—they’re just jumping from hype to hype. Learn exactly how to convert opportunistic visitors into lifetime ecosystem contributors. Typical incentives create short-lived spikes, not genuine loyalty. Flipside's Blockchain User Retention Analysis reveals striking differences in user retention: → Low-value addresses (scores 0-3) consistently show retention below 5% after 6 months, with most dropping off completely after just the first month. → Medium-value addresses (scores 4-7) initially drop off significantly, stabilizing around 20% retention, indicating untapped potential for deeper engagement. → High-value addresses (scores 8+) retain at rates 3-5x higher (35-38%) than low value addresses, decreasing only gradually (5-8% monthly) Cross-chain insights highlight even deeper nuances: → Ethereum and Avalanche have notably stronger high-value user retention compared to other major chains. → Solana, despite its size, struggles more with retaining high-value addresses than smaller ecosystems. → Newer chains tend to experience steeper retention decay curves, making structured engagement strategies even more critical. The solution? Structured, Intelligence-Driven Growth (IDG) user journeys. IDG systematically elevates user loyalty by: → Crafting targeted user paths through key ecosystem protocols. → Leveraging wallet scoring to identify and nurture high-potential users. → Continuously optimizing user journeys based on real-time behavioral data. Here's the proven impact of structured IDG journeys: ✅ Wallets completing structured journeys increase their user scores by an average of 2-3 points. ✅ They consistently demonstrate higher transaction frequency, governance participation, and long-term retention. ✅ Over 30% of key protocol activity is driven by users who've engaged in IDG journeys. Stop chasing temporary visitors. Start building lasting, high-value contributors with structured, intelligent user journeys. P.S. Curious to dive deeper into creating loyal blockchain communities? Join our G² Growth Collective Telegram group to network and discuss with other web3 Growth leaders. 🤝 Link in the comments. ♻️ Repost this to help others in your network. 📌 And follow Aram Mughalyan for web3 content like this.

Duolingo got 9M users to maintain a 365+ day streak. That's 24% of their DAUs. Most health & education apps have streaks. The reality is: very few drive meaningful retention with them. Why? Duolingo has shipped 600+ experiments just on streaks. It's their main feature besides lessons, and it took years to get right. But you don't need hundreds of experiments to improve your streak retention. Start with copy—it's one of the highest-impact, lowest-effort changes you can make. Duolingo’s biggest retention win was replacing their default CTA copy from “Continue” to “Commit to my goal”. Here's what behavioral science tells us to focus on: 1️⃣ Tap into identity Instead of: "Continue your streak" Write: "Keep your promise to yourself" Why? People act in ways that confirm their self-image. 2️⃣ Frame setbacks as temporary Instead of: "You lost your streak" Write: "Ready to resume your progress?" Why? The brain processes "lost" as permanent, "resume" as temporary. 3️⃣ Highlight preserved progress Instead of: "Start a new streak" Write: "Your progress is saved. Continue your journey" Why? Sunk cost psychology keeps users invested if they see their history isn't lost. The key to retention isn't preventing breaks. It's making comebacks easy.

“It’s not enough to just win,” an old boss of mine used to explain. “The other side has to lose, badly.” Nothing gave him more satisfaction than eating his rivals’ lunch - and his competitive nature was contagious. When I started my first business I adopted his approach. But I soon also learned that I had to ally that competitive spirit with a more nuanced approach if I was to retain clients rather than just churn through them. Unlike winning deals, retention isn't just about having the best product — it's about creating value and a level of reliability that rivals can't match. 1. Retain on value, not price: Competitors will use price to try and attract your customers. It’s tempting to drop your yield accordingly, but that’s a race to the bottom. Instead take time to make sure your client can see how much they get for every pound or dollar they invest. Adding extra value will always be more profitable than reducing your fee. 2. Add features before you’re asked to: Write a customer engagement strategy that involves adding useful new services or features for your existing customers at least once or twice a year. Use these to upsell, build loyalty and increase their pain of moving suppliers. 3. Build trust through relentless delivery: Unreliability is one of the top reasons clients will look elsewhere. Meet key clients on a regular basis to understand how their needs are evolving and pivot your offering accordingly. And always keep your promises. 4. Outmanoeuvre your competitors: Never underestimate how determined your competitors will be to knock you off your perch. Devote adequate time to learning from their approach so you know the threat you face. Match your instinct to win new business with an equal determination to retain customers. Crack that and not only will you eat your competitors’ lunch today but you’ll have it every day.

I'm 99% sure you've deleted an app because it made you feel terrible. Think about it: → Habit trackers remind you of 0% progress → Femtech remind you of hormonal fluctuations → Fitness apps dictate how to feel about your weight → Activity trackers tell you you're not moving enough What happens next? You uninstall it [churn] You stop engaging with it [low retention] You shout about it online [negative reputation] It's a lose, lose for everyone The people using it suffer, and so does the business The truth is: We experience these situations ourselves. But, we deliver the same impacts to our users. People's contexts and emotions matter It's the difference between loving, or deleting the app For example: → Person A: I've made 0% progress, time to work! → Person B: 0% progress... I'm not good enough. We need to put people back at the heart of our services/ products Here's some things you can do: →  Research. Understand people's goals and contexts →  Think about how people's situation could change →  Understand the reasons why people might leave →  Tailor messaging for usage, activity and goals →  Give user's control - don't decide for them →  Map the unhappy paths and "edge-cases" →  Think about how people could be feeling →  Identify where your assumptions are →  Obsess over the words you use There's no shortcut; it's about understanding people At every step ask. How could people be impacted? Intentionally or unintentionally Positively or negatively If you can think it, chances are, people will experience it So, if we want to increase retention, reduce churn, create brand loyalty and generally deliver good products/services, we need to consider; experiences Design for people, always 💛 --- PS Sometimes people's circumstances mean they have to leave, not because they want to. Stay tuned for a post on offboarding!

Are you familiar with the difference between “nudge” and “sludge”? Both are terms popularized by Richard Thaler & Cass Sunstein, but they have opposite connotations.   A #nudge is a subtle policy or design change that gently steers people toward a particular decision without restricting their freedom of choice. It's based on the idea that small and seemingly insignificant details can influence our behaviour in significant ways.   The classic example of a nudge is designing pension schemes to automatically enrol new employees. You can choose to opt out, but by default you are included. This policy ensures that young people begin saving for their retirement when their contributions can make the largest difference. In other words, it is solely intended to benefit the employee.   In contrast, #sludge refers to friction or barriers that make a process more difficult, often deterring people from making the decision they want or following through with an action. Sludge can take the form of unnecessary paperwork, complex jargon, or any other design element that impedes or slows down decision-making, often resulting in people giving up on a choice or benefit they might otherwise have pursued.   From Amazon forcing you to reject purchasing Amazon Prime every single time you buy a product to the ridiculously long process needed to delete a Facebook account, the digital landscape is unfortunately rife with sludge.    Last week I tried to unsubscribe from The Economist and experienced this first hand. The option to unsubscribe is buried several menus deep in the account settings and even then, you are forced to either phone them (and wait in a queue) or enter a live chat. Once in the chat, I had to rebuff three different new offers before I finally succeeded. It took 30 seconds to sign up for a subscription and 20 frustrating minutes to cancel. Pure sludge.   These types of practices are obviously bad for consumers, but it turns out they are bad for companies as well and can result in:   👉 Brand reputation damage. When consumers encounter sludge, they associate the brand with negative experiences. This can lead to a damaged reputation, especially in a world where individuals can share their frustrations with a large audience online.   👉 Loss of trust. Trust is a critical component of customer loyalty. Sludge practices can erode trust as customers may feel manipulated or trapped by a company's services or products.   👉 Reduced customer lifetime value. In the long term, if sludge leads to customer dissatisfaction, it can decrease the lifetime value of customers who may choose to take their business elsewhere.   Brands like John Lewis and M&S that have flexible return policies, for instance, have strong customer loyalty, good trust in the brand and sell more items, offsetting the higher cost of returns. Care to share any favourite examples of sludge you’ve experienced?

I get irrationally frustrated when I spend ages researching a product - bouncing between websites, reviews, and platforms - only to finally commit… and then discover it’s out of stock. It feels like all that intent, time, and energy just evaporates. The reality is that there is a large gap in online capabilities across the industry. As a consumer, instances of things like "stockouts" don't just cost a sale, they erode trust, halt customer acquisition and destroy momentum. And in a world where convenience wins, even good intentions can be undone by a single friction point. It turns out I’m not alone. Our research with Microsoft Advertising shows that 28% of shoppers often experience this, among a range of other points of friction that are damaging retailers’ sales. Every misaligned landing page, every broken promotion, every out-of-stock item that shows up in search… it's just bad UX. Our research uncovered a staggering insight: 1 in 5 shopping journeys are abandoned due to friction. And it’s high-value shoppers, digitally engaged customers, who are the least forgiving. 1️⃣ Friction isn’t random. It’s predictable. We saw six recurring issues: ➡️ Misaligned landing pages ➡️ Stock inaccuracies ➡️ Unexpected shipping costs ➡️ Price discrepancies ➡️ Failed promotions ➡️ Inconsistent loyalty rewards Each one chips away at trust and encourages shoppers to look elsewhere. 2️⃣ Frequent online shoppers experience the most friction. These are the customers who shop regularly, spend more, and are more digitally engaged. And they’re the ones facing the most pain: ➡️ 41% say the product page didn’t match the ad ➡️ 40% had discount codes fail at checkout ➡️ 39% encountered stock-outs at the last step ➡️ 38% saw price changes post-click ➡️ 37% said loyalty rewards didn’t carry over The most valuable customers with the highest LTV are being let down the most. 3️⃣ Friction hurts conversion and loyalty. Our research shows that over 50% of consumers spend less with brands when they encounter friction. And 40% will look elsewhere entirely if there’s inconsistency between your app, website or store. The bottom line is that poor UX has a direct impact on profitability. And the six areas of friction signal deeper-rooted issues across teams, tech stacks, and channels. And that misalignment is directly costing conversion, customer lifetime value, and brand trust. 💥 Inventory not syncing with front-end search. 💥 Promotions set centrally but broken at the point of checkout. 💥 Loyalty schemes behaving differently across touchpoints. Fixing this means aligning merch, tech, marketing and supply chain around the same journey, the one customers are actually taking. There is also an irony about how much it costs to acquire customers, when many retailers are then just disappointing them. Consistency in pricing, promotions, availability and experience is a strategic differentiator. 🔗 Download the report now https://lnkd.in/e9abZQQW