Jaisen Mathai
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08:06:18 pm on July 28, 2009 | # |
95% of PubliciTweet users complete the flow to link their PubliciTweet account with at least one of their Twitter accounts. Securely granting one application access to an account in another application is a tall order. There are dozens of security concerns which wind up making the final user experience far from optimal.
We took many considerations into account when we were designing our OAuth flow which would take you off-site to Twitter. As soon as the user leaves PubliciTweet we completely lose control of the user experience. The best case scenario is that they go to Twitter, click approve and come right back. More often than not, they’ll be required to log in to Twitter at which point we cross our fingers that they do it correctly the first time else the completion rate drops. Worst case scenario is that Twitter’s site has a problem and they land on an error page. Needless to say, it’s a very fragile flow.
We were quite surprised that the follow through rate is so high. We’re curious what other teams’ experiences have been like. Is 95% common or are we doing something right? If so we’d love to share the thought process which went into designing our flow. Are others getting higher than 95%? If so we’d love to hear what you’re doing that we’re not.
In the end the goal is to give the user a great experience. Things need to work the way they expect it to. That’s often the biggest challenge when dealing with complicate flows that require handshakes between two people that have never met. Hopefully, mastering that will make the rest of the experience bliss.
