Background
Context
The average American spends close to $1,728* a year on their cell phone bill but doesn't have enough savings to cover a $1,000 emergency expense.
Many of the big wireless carriers hike prices while customers fall further behind on their bills. By comparison, TextNow is the first carrier to get advertisers to pay for cell phone service, so customers can get rid of their bill and keep more money for the things that matter. *As of 2024, CNBC reported that the average monthly expense for a cell phone plan stands at $144.
TextNow is the only free wireless phone service provider with unlimited talk & text and essential data on the nation's largest 5G network, all in one convenient app.
Background
Team & Role
I led the UX/UI design effort, collaborating with a multidisciplinary team of 20 made from the Wireless team, Design, UX Research, Growth/CRM and Marketing.
Deliverables include wireframes, user flows, prototypes, hi-fidelity designs, handoff-ready assets, documentation and design verification for Android, iOS, and Web. The team consisted of 4 Product Leads: Design & Product, Growth/CRM, Wireless and Marketing, 1 Technical Project Manager, 2 Vertical Leads, 4 Backend, Web, iOS and Android Client Engineers, 2 User Researchers and 3 Quality Assurance Engineers.
How can we charge people less while giving them more and change what consumers expect from their mobile service providers?
Problem
How do we know this is a problem?
The UXR team ran a survey to understand more about how users currently use TextNow. We also launched four different experiments that offered users some amount of free data with their base plan.
The surveys revealed insights about data usage, which apps would be most useful, and that framing the data as ‘utility-forward’ may resonate more. The experiments offered users some amount of free data with their base plan, in an effort to learn what users responded to, as well as what was most likely to be financially viable.
Problem
Objective
Introduce a permanent, free data offering for all users as part of our base plan; the offering should be financially viable and presented as utility forward.
Alignment
Constraints
There were technical limitations on how plans and add-ons were structured in backend, limiting how we can present the base plans within UI for launch.
We were limited to supporting an older SHP structure that was soon to be sunset and eventually replaced with a newer SHP— which was already designed, built in React, and being rolled out next Quarter. Design time (2 weeks). Development time (8 weeks).
Process
Exploration
We explored ways to communicate our essential base offering throughout touch points of our app, including updates to the Self-Help-Portal.
We conducted UX research in Q4/22' to validate comprehension and basic UX of our new base plan within SHP. I created a prototype to assist the UXR team with these studies.
We considered approaches that would provide clear messaging and function, but require less redesign and engineering resources. There was significant back & forth between teams on if we were going with an ‘Add On vs. Plan structure, and was further complicated by how our existing Backend was built.
Our data offering could not be complete without covering all edge cases, error states, upgrade and downgrade flows. Design verification ran in parallel with QA for thorough testing on iOS, Android and Web before launch.
Process
Overview
Examine the problem
Foundational research/data
Surveys
Experiments
Foundational research/data
Surveys
Experiments
Understand
Objective, goal, users, demographics.
Synthesizing research/data
Product requirements
User stories
Synthesizing research/data
Product requirements
User stories
Brainstorm
Experiment, explore, fail, go on an adventure
Concept exploration
User flows
Wireframes
Prototyping
Design reviews
User testing
Concept exploration
User flows
Wireframes
Prototyping
Design reviews
User testing
Refine
High fidelity design
Design reviews
Design documentation
Handoff
Design verification / QA
A/B testing
Rinse and Repeat
Design reviews
Design documentation
Handoff
Design verification / QA
A/B testing
Rinse and Repeat
Solution
Design
We introduced free essential data for all users as part of our base plan, offering customers free data for email, maps, rideshare apps and unlimited calling and texting on the nation's largest 5G network.
This free Essential Data offering propels TextNow's mission to democratize reliable phone service by ensuring that customers never have to worry about losing connectivity because of an unpaid phone bill. The plan includes up to 1GB of free essential app usage (email, navigation, and rideshare).
We introduced free essential data for all users as part of our base plan, differentiating us among our competitors, which increased monthly data user engagement over 74% and increased conversions by 5% from free to paid users.
