Funnel Vision: How Xapo Bank Saw 2x Growth in Onboarding

Products:
Amplitude Analytics, Amplitude Experiment
Use Case:
Growth
Industries:
Financial Services
Regions:
Americas
IN THIS STORY

              2x

              more users completing the onboarding process

              20-30

              experiments completed within a year

              Insight/Action/Outcome: For this leading Bitcoin and banking group, seamless and secure onboarding is key to widespread adoption. Previously, the product team knew users were dropping off but needed help understanding why. Using Amplitude Analytics highlighted some opportunities for improvement in the customer onboarding journey. Using funnels, cohorts, and after a lot of experimentation, they identified the root causes, eventually doubling the conversion rate in the new onboarding process.

              Xapo Bank is the world’s first Bitcoin and banking group to merge traditional finance with crypto fully in one banking app. Founded in 2013, it has evolved from an e-money wallet into a digital-first bank that is regulated by the Gibraltar Financial Services Commission. It enables members from nearly every corner of the globe to maximize the value of their Bitcoin by offering a competitive interest rate without needing to stake, lend, or lock up assets. Members can make their Bitcoin work harder by easily converting it to USD and investing in the US S&P 500 and NASDAQ stocks or select cryptocurrencies, or their USD can earn interest. They can also spend their Bitcoin as easily as fiat with a universally accepted debit card.

              However, being a trailblazer can be challenging, especially in the highly regulated financial sector. “As product managers overseeing customer onboarding, we want to ensure stringent security and regulatory compliance measures are in place to thoroughly vet new users, all while delivering a seamless and top-notch user experience,” says Razvan Halbac, Product Manager for Customer Onboarding at Xapo Bank.

              Ensuring a smooth onboarding experience can be challenging without understanding the user's pain points. “Where are the friction points? Why are customers dropping off?” These are the questions Xapo Bank’s growth team needs to answer, and Amplitude gives them the insights they need to do just that.

              Unexpected reasons behind the big drop

              One vital part of the onboarding journey that Razvan and his colleague Joe Eppel, Product Owner of Customer Acquisition and Onboarding, wanted to investigate was the KYC (know your customer) process. This crucial step ensures applicants are who they claim to be, which is particularly important in a digital onboarding environment.

              The product team knew from their old analytics dashboards that users were dropping off during this process, but they needed help figuring out why. However, the custom-made system built by data scientists was complex, cumbersome, and not deep enough to explain that. "Any tweak meant relying on a data scientist or engineer, which wasn’t scalable going forward," admits Razvan.

              Determined to explore the user experience in depth in a self-service manner, the product team switched to Amplitude Analytics. Using the funnel charts, they broke down the user journey into detailed events to understand the applicant behavior at each stage during the onboarding process. ”Only then we started to understand which steps of the journey are the most problematic," Razvan says.

              For example, one of the challenges in the onboarding process was the applicant identity verification step. Even before the team adopted Amplitude Analytics, significant drop-offs were noticed at this stage. The working hypothesis was that the issue stemmed from applicants submitting invalid identity documents.

              However, with more detailed insights from Amplitude events, the team discovered that in some regions, applicants weren't even attempting to submit an identity document." By building and analyzing user cohorts, for instance, those based on the applicant country, we understood that many applicants often didn't have the specific type of identity document that we would require in their region,” explains Razvan. “For example, passports are not commonly used as a proof of identity in all regions of the world."

              Overall, the number of applicants starting the identity verification step increased by 50%, resulting in more approved customers.

              author photo
              Razvan Halbac
              Product Manager for Customer Onboarding

              Adding more options doubles conversions

              Seeing regional differences, Xapo Bank teamed up with identity authentication partners specializing in different areas and document types to increase the variety of documents supported as proof of identity. This decision boosted conversion rates and grew their user base. "Overall, the number of applicants starting the identity verification step increased by 50%, resulting in more approved customers." reveals Razvan.

              But identity checks were just one example. By diving into data, Xapo Bank improved growth in many ways. Expanding cohorts and analyzing users helped them develop and test numerous hypotheses with Amplitude Experiment. "Understanding these nuances between different customer groups through cohorting was a pivotal moment," shares Joe. "We started listing hypotheses on why users behave in this or that way to prove or disprove them and stop acting blindly."

              Before Amplitude, we could only see the start and end of a user’s journey, but the rest of the journey remained a mystery. Now, we can dive into each user's actions and understand the why behind their behavior.

              author photo
              Razvan Halbac
              Product Manager for Customer Onboarding

              Out-of-the-box thinking adds value

              In just a year, the bank ran about 30 experiments on conversion points, in some cases achieving a 2X increase in conversion rates and ultimately more Xapo Bank members. One key test involved rearranging onboarding questions to minimize friction and smooth the process. Sometimes, just changing the order of steps boosted user engagement significantly. “Before Amplitude, we could only see the start and end of a user’s journey, but the rest of the journey remained a mystery,” remarks Razvan. “Now, we can dive into each user's actions and understand their timing. Amplitude lets us discover product details like never before.”

              Xapo Bank, always innovating, found other creative uses for Amplitude analyses and experiments beyond tracking user experience. “We realized we could also integrate back office processes and trigger events to track how we work,” shares Joe. “This dispelled a common myth that Amplitude is only for analyzing user behavior and flows.”

              Now, Xapo Bank uses Amplitude internally to track operational KPIs and performance metrics. For example, whenever a user is stuck at a step, we now have visibility and understand whether the user needs to take action or someone in our operations team needs to perform a manual task in our back office.

              Amplitude makes product data super accessible. Now, our whole company thinks about metrics, not just the product team.

              author photo
              Joe Eppel
              Product Owner of Customer Acquisition and Onboarding

              Rethinking work through data

              Everyone at the bank now uses Amplitude for analytics—from product managers and designers to engineers and customer support. Every day, dashboards are automatically shared in the company's general Slack channel, keeping everyone updated on the product, users, and data.

              "What I am proud of the most is that 100% of my engineers check Amplitude daily to see the impact of their work," says Joe. "Amplitude makes product data super accessible. Now, our whole company thinks about metrics, not just the product team. It's changed how we work and approach data."

              With everyone having access to the same information, efficiency has improved. Data-driven discussions replace subjective debates, saving time. If there's a problem, teams can form hypotheses and run experiments to check them. "Data doesn't lie," Joe says.

              More is more

              While they continue investigating onboarding, Joe and Razvan are gearing up for the next phase. They want to examine cohorts more closely to understand subtle nuances between users better and are eager to promote experiments among other teams.

              For those just starting with Amplitude and data, both offer this advice: "Although the principle of 'less is more' often holds true, I believe it doesn't apply to Amplitude events. In this case, the more events you create, the richer the insights you'll gain," Razvan says. Feeling overwhelmed by all the data? "Create a roadmap and take it step by step through each process,” Joe recommends. "Make data tracking second nature for your teams. If they can't measure their work, it won't make an impact."