Redesigning ARR
Growing usage 135%
Couldn't use, wouldn't use
We launched Advanced Recipient Routing (ARR) in 2019. This allowed users to define who received the envelope based on conditional logic. However, we were finding that lots of people had bought it but couldn’t use it.
After an investigation, the reason became clear: the feature was too confusing. Users weren't confident that what they setup would work. As the senior UX copywriter, I partnered with product management, design, research, and information architecture teams to improve the user experience.
Baseline testing
While we had a sense of what was wrong, we needed to confirm what issues to focus on. We found a group of 9 DocuSign template creators with no experience with this feature for a remote moderated study.
Questions
What was their comfort level today in managing multi-signer flows?
When in the flow did users expect to set up routing logic?
How would they want to set up logic with multiple signers?
How confident were they that they'd set it up correctly?
Findings
Users were easily confused between regular signers and conditional signers. 'Conditional recipient' wasn't an easy to use concept.
Users thought conditional logic was only tied to specific fields. They didn't understand that it could impact who received the document.
They weren't confident that they'd set up their flows correctly
Our instincts were confirmed by these findings. From a content perspective, we needed to update the terminology and ensure the UX content was as simple as possible.
Simplifying terminology
A key area to simplify was the terminology. With our head of information architecture, we did a competitive analysis and reviewed the users' natural language from the baseline.
We found that rules and focusing on what the logic would impact, routing, might be the best way forward. Our terminology update included:
Conditional recipient groups --> Routing groups
Conditional recipient --> Routing recipient
Conditional logic ---> Routing rules
It helped us create a foundation for future logic based features. They could all use rules with a modifier.
We tried this concept in our next round of testing. We included both participants from the baseline and existing ARR users. We found users easily understood these concepts and how they worked.
Creating clear content
As we worked on higher fidelity prototypes, we focused more on UX content. We used entry points to help explain the feature in simple terms. We tested the readability of the content was below an 8th grade reading level and included content in design reviews for feedback and rapid iteration.
In the month after these updates hit production, we saw a tremendous increase in usage. By making it easier to understand and use, users had confidence in what they were doing and how to set up these important transactions carefully.