An independent initiative to boost sign-up conversion at Motorway, tackling a critical 50% drop-off rate at a key funnel stage.
TIMELINE
Q2 2025
COMPANY
Motorway
ROLE
Product Designer
At Motorway, our core business relies on connecting car sellers with buyers. While our platform successfully attracted users interested in valuations, I observed a critical bottleneck: a staggering 50% drop-off rate at the personal information entry step during sign-up. This wasn't just a conversion metric; it represented a significant loss of potential inventory and revenue for the business.
Addressing this specific friction point presented a clear business imperative. By improving this step, we projected converting an additional 2,000 leads into active users weekly, directly expanding our car inventory pipeline and significantly boosting sales. My initial analysis suggested a 0.8% to 5% increase in overall conversion could be realised through strategic changes.
The initial journey successfully delivered quick value by immediately showing users their vehicle valuation. However, we found that speed to value wasn't enough to persuade all users to convert their initial interest into a Motorway account. The screen itself was quite plain, lacking the key elements necessary to effectively build trust, clearly communicate benefits, and motivate users to complete the sign-up process. This directly contributed to the high drop-off we observed.
[What was done]
To address this conversion bottleneck, my approach moved beyond surface-level analytics. While data clearly identified where the drop-off occurred, I prioritized understanding the why and what would truly resonate with users. This involved:
Qualitative research: Through examining user interviews and analysis of customer support interactions, I uncovered three primary user apprehensions:
- Trust: Users were hesitant to share personal data early without sufficient perceived value.
- Motivation: Many were in an exploratory phase, finding the account creation step a premature commitment.
- Comprehension: Users often lacked a clear understanding of Motorway's process and benefits upon direct site access.
Strategic ideation & prioritisation: Leveraging the conversion.com Lever framework (focusing on Trust, Usability, Comprehension, Motivation, and Cost), I generated a diverse set of hypotheses to directly counter these user apprehensions. Each design concept was then rigorously evaluated using the ICE (Impact, Confidence, Ease) scoring model to ensure I focused on the most impactful and resource-efficient solutions for the business. This process led to the design and proposal of five distinct solutions aimed at mitigating sign-up friction.
[Final thoughts]
While the A/B test for my proposed solutions is currently underway, early qualitative feedback and directional metrics are highly encouraging, pointing towards a significantly improved user experience and enhanced comprehension at the critical sign-up stage. I anticipate that this clarity will translate into a substantial uplift in sign-up completion, directly impacting key downstream business metrics such as car offer acceptance rates and, ultimately, revenue generation for Motorway. Definitive quantitative results are expected by July, which will further validate the business impact of this design-led intervention. This project highlighted the critical importance of blending quantitative analytics with deep qualitative insights to diagnose core business problems and design truly effective, data-informed solutions—all driven by an independent strategic vision.