Introduction
Board Game Geek (BGG) is an amazing website filled with lots of useful features for those who know where to look. Much of its value comes from personalization features and its community of friends and content creators. However, after signing up you really have to dig around to both find and set up this functionality.
Problem statement
Today customers that sign up on BGG are dropped off where they began their journey on the website and it’s not clear what a user should do next. An improved signup workflow could help personalize the experience and introduce useful features board gamers want to know about.
Design Process
Understanding what's wrong
When I consider how new customers learn about features on BGG, it seems most likely they’ve heard by word of mouth. If you visit the website it’s mostly conveyed as a news website for media consumption.
Current BGG homepage design
This benefits casual users as they can enjoy the content without signing in or distractions from unused features. However, for customers that do want to leverage that functionality, how discoverable is it? I conducted a contextual inquiry by watching a potential customer interact with the website. Their goal was to sign up and add their library of board games to their profile.
Journey map
Signing up was unobtrusive and easy to complete, but did not introduce the full functionality and usefulness of the product. After creating an account, there are no prompts on what to do next or what value you’ve gained by becoming a registered user of the website.
A better onboarding experience
I started creating wireframes for a signup workflow that would introduce new features accessible to registered users. I identified several areas of information that would enhance customer’s experience by personalizing their content and interactions on the website.
Wireframes flow
While I believe adding these additional steps is a good thing for new users and sets them up for success, it was important to me to not take away the simplicity of the current experience. Before initiating the stepped workflow, there is a chance to skip that. Even if they continue, all steps are optional.
Testing the flow
I went to work on a higher fidelity prototype to get richer feedback on the design. Most of the design variations I explored during low-fi wireframing made this phase of work mostly focused on visuals. I tried to make the personalization steps feel in line with the branding of the signup form, while also adding some visual flare to the steps.
Next Steps
While this added workflow for users signing up, it was a start towards a better experience. There are many more areas that could be improved with this site. There is still the issue of where to take users post account creation, for example. Or how the dashboard could facilitate streamlined access to things like collection, play logs, or media sharing. Additionally, I also observed how the collection management UI is dated and cumbersome to use during the journey map. Given more time, I would explore enhancements to all of these areas and more.
