chani - onboarding
01
Chani
2025
When I joined CHANI as Product Designer, the app had no formal onboarding flow. New users were dropped straight into a content-heavy astrology experience with little guidance.
I was tasked with designing an onboarding system from the ground up: one that would set new users up for success, reduce the burden on our customer experience team, and make the value of CHANI immediately clear.
Over four months, I led end-to-end research, design, and cross-functional collaboration to ship a three-pronged continuous onboarding solution. The results surpassed expectations.
GOALS
Reduce user drop-off and Customer Experience help desk volume by clarifying the app experience upfront.
Communicate free vs. premium content clearly to new users.
Build a guided, contextual onboarding system that scales with the app over time.
CHANI is a content-heavy app built around astrology, a subject that comes with its own terminology, systems, and learning curve. For new users, this created an immediate barrier. Without any onboarding infrastructure, users were left to figure out the app on their own, and many didn't get far.
And the problem wasn't just a UX gap, it was a business one too. Our CX team was fielding a high volume of support requests for issues that better design could solve. Plus we didn't have email verification so our marketing and recovery capabilities were severely limited.
Business need: Reduce CX overhead, improve email verification rates, and remove friction from the sign-up funnel to support growth.
problem to solve
the research
My first step was sitting down with our customer experience team and combing through their help desk tickets. What I found was eye-opening. A large volume of requests centered around issues that were entirely preventable with better UX. Together, we grouped the tickets into five main categories:
To hear directly from users, I designed and launched a survey via Google Forms. Over two months, we collected around 500 responses. I reviewed each one individually and categorized them into themes using affinity mapping. The most consistent themes that emerged were:
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account recovery
Users who forgot their passwords had virtually no way back in, a fixable gap silently costing CHANI its own users.
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Subscription confusion
With no clear breakdown of free vs. premium, users hit frustration before they'd experienced the app's real value.
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Astrology literacy
New users needed foundational context about astrology itself to make sense of what CHANI was showing them.
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Guidance
From birth time setup to feature discovery, users were hitting friction points a single well-placed explanation could have resolved.
How Might We…
the ideation
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Welcome flow
swipeable first impression that previews CHANI's best features before sign-up.
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sign up process
Upfront context on free vs. premium content, astrology systems, and verification of user accounts.
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in-app guidance
Contextual buttons placed at key moments to surface guidance without disrupting flow.
the user testing
Welcome Flow Learnings
Sign-Up Flow Learnings
Easter Egg Learnings
the final designs
a better welcome
Before users ever reached the sign-up screen, we had an opportunity to make a strong first impression and clearly communicate CHANI's value. The original app skipped this entirely.
I redesigned the entry experience to include a swipeable value proposition flow. A series of screens previewed CHANI's best features and gave new users a glimpse of what was waiting for them once they signed up. The tone was warm, the visuals were on-brand, and the copy was written to spark curiosity.
improved sign-up flow
The sign-up flow had several gaps that were directly contributing to CX tickets and account recovery issues. I redesigned the flow to address each one.
Email Verification: We introduced a code-based email verification step. This not only improved account security and recovery, but significantly expanded our pool of verified email addresses, a meaningful win for marketing and re-engagement campaigns.
Free Vs. Premium Clarity: A new screen broke down exactly what users got for free and what required a subscription, removing one of the most common sources of confusion post-sign-up.
Birth Time Guidance: We added clear, compassionate copy explaining what to do if users didn't have their exact birth time, It was a small but impactful addition that reduced a recurring friction point.
Astrology System Guidance: We clarified upfront that CHANI uses Whole Sign Houses and the Rising Sign for transits, which helped set accurate expectations for users familiar with other systems.
Easter Egg Learnings
This was the most creative part of the redesign and ultimately the one with the biggest measurable impact.
CHANI already had a design element we could build on: small teal buttons embedded throughout the app. These had existed before, but were underutilized and inconsistently placed. I saw an opportunity to transform them into a contextual guidance system, what we ended up called "easter eggs."
The idea was simple. Rather than forcing users through a tutorial, we placed these buttons strategically at the exact moments where users were most likely to have questions. Tapping one would surface a short, educational explanation, written in CHANI's warm, brand-consistent voice, right when it was most relevant.
To make them more effective I:
Added imagery that reflected the content and felt true to the CHANI brand
Rewrote the copy to be more informative and educational, not just decorative
Placed buttons deliberately at known drop-off and confusion points identified in our research
Fig. 01 - Swipe to see CHANI Onboarding
the results
the future
further recommendations
Looking ahead, there are two areas I'd prioritize to build on this foundation:
in-app glossary: Accessible via the hamburger menu, a glossary of astrology terms would extend the educational mission of the onboarding system and reduce reliance on external resources.
the lessons
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continous onboarding beats one times tutorials
Meeting users with guidance in context, at the exact moment they need it, is far more effective than front-loading a walkthrough they'll forget.
The easter egg system proved that small, well-placed interactions can have outsized impact on engagement.
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cx Teams are an underutilized research scource
The help desk audit was one of the most productive research activities in the entire project. The tickets were essentially a direct line to unmet user needs, already categorized by frequency and urgency.
Every designer should start here before reaching for a survey.
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small ux changes, meaningful results
Some of the highest-impact changes in this project were the simplest: a line of copy explaining birth time, a screen breaking down free vs. premium, a teal button placed in the right spot.
The biggest gains didn't always come from the most complex solutions.