One of the problems with increasing user-retention in Second Life is, well, pretty simply that for 99 (or more) out of 100 people who don’t stick around (or don’t even log in), we never find out why.
Oh, we can guess at it. We can say “Well, Second Life is confusing.” or “The viewer UI is terrible!”
But we don’t actually know that for sure that those are the problems. The problem essentially is that we don’t know what the problems are.
You don’t know and I don’t know. Linden Lab might have some clues if they’ve studied this intensively enough, but the rest of us don’t have much of an idea.
Every day somewhere between approximately 9,000 and 13,000 new Second Life accounts get created.
Some of them may not log in the first time for days, weeks, or months after that. We don’t know how many.
Some of them don’t ever log in at all. We don’t know how many of those there are, but it might be about 8 percent based on some numbers I’ve seen.
As for the rest, we don’t know why they go, because when they decide to log out and never come back, they don’t actually tell anyone. It isn’t like they run into a problem with orientation, or the UI or lag and grab someone and say “Hey, X is a problem, so I’m leaving now.”
No, they just log off and that’s it.
And there’s the nub of the problem with improving the new user experience.
We don’t know what, exactly, each of their problems are or how important they are in absolute numbers. Without that information, we can’t say that making any specific change would be better.
Oh, lots of us will say that sort of thing anyway, but the odds of success are extraordinarily low. We’re just guessing based on our own experiences, and the experiences of new users that we’ve met… and those people are the ones who didn’t have the problems that we’re all hoping to fix. They either didn’t notice them, or overcame them without giving it much thought.
Unfortunately, they’re not representative of the 99% or so who don’t make it.
We all agree that there’s a problem, and we’re all proposing solutions, but the simple fact is that none of us truly has any idea about what the problems actually are and which of those problems are the really important ones.
Linden Lab maybe has some answers as to what the problems are. They’ve done studies, surveys, focus groups and usability tests. It’s possible they have some information that could be shared, and lead to possible solutions in the viewer that might help.
But without data, we’re just rolling dice, espousing our own personal preferences and trying to sound authoritative.
Part of the problem with not knowing is that there is no form or survey where Linden Labs says, “Avatar X you have not logged back in XX days. If you don’t plan to return, please fill out this questionnaire about your experience when using Second Life.” That coupled with a form on the reasons they did not return, would help facilitate what it is that needs to be done to get and keep people in SL. An email would be the most inexpensive way to find out what happened. It may not be the viewer but something else entirely. I fully agree that LL should share the data, if they have it, so those of us who are sticking with it can see whether our gripes are the norm or our own biased opinion.
Assuming people get all the way to registration and first login, it’s pretty hard to ignore that your avatar is really ugly compared to everyone else’s. Getting to the point where you have an avatar that you’re not embarrassed to wear is a huge hurdle to get over. Add this to the fact that you’re probably not thrilled with the name you chose, and basically, you’re playing an ugly person with a stupid name. Who wants to do that?
Of course, UI and general UX issues play into the ugly avatar thing: you really mean to tell me that in order to shop in a virtual world I have to go to a physical store that’s laid out significantly worse than a shopping mall, or go to a crappy web site with crappy recommendations, where I can’t try most clothes on before I buy them?
It seems to me that whatever else might happen, including crashes or drama, people’s enjoying assuming their SL identity will keep them coming back for more.
Of course, being able to find stuff you enjoy doing would make a huge difference as well; turning a 3d virtual world into a crappy pile of flat pages that’s indexed with Google Search Appliances is just insulting.
Hm, there is a lot of guessing.
.
The ‘first user hour’-thing was/is maybe not wrong. During this first phase a new users’ opinion and future decisions are often shaped, i guess
I think Phil Lindens thought of ‘bringing new users closer and directly to content’ is a good idea, because it answers the most asked question(s).
The top questions i heard from new users are:
1a. “What can i do here/now ?”
1b. “Where is all the fun ?”
…followed by specific “how do i chat/move/meet/find…” questions.
So, bringing users to ‘their’ content and satisfying their expectations is hopefully the way to go to make more people getting deeper involved and longer staying.
If you take a look around at those of us who have stayed I think you see a few common denominators…
Of those perhaps these two lead a list….
Many of us are stubborn, goal driven, and problem solvers at some level…
Secondlife or any user content virtual world requires a vivid imagination…
On the downside, Secondlife is not easy you must be able to think for yourself…
There is no clear cut definable goal…. where in our “real life”, from earliest childhood, we are hopefully groomed to get an education and life skills… in Secondlife there is no ‘script’.
I am stubborn, I have always had a vivid imagination, those were my total skills when I joined Secondlife in May 2007.
At age 65 I got my first PC, I came to Secondlife unable to even copy/paste {and some believe I’ve not got much further =^..^= }.
My first few weeks here weren’t that much fun…but I did figure out “how this ‘game’ is played”….
Here’s what happened….I met an avatar from late 2003, Prissielou Flora, who befriended me and made me feel ‘apart of’. She didn’t hold my hand, take me to school, give me anything except the single most important thing in Secondlife…..the feeling I belonged.
I know, in the words of an early Linden, “it won”t scale”.
As a company policy the Lab can’t provide one on one mentoring and some of the mentors they did have got a little out of hand.
I have had phenomenal success working with new people over these last three plus years… primarily just answering questions. Yes it’s great to give them a few freebies and before the latest default avies a necessary thing… but what they really want was said by Blue Szondi some months ago.
” In this world I have seen the lame dance, the mute wax poetic and the lowly thrive. SL can change peoples lives. Some for better some for worse but still if they cant understand the basics, how to open a box or pan their camera so they can see the face of their avatar, things we see as simple but so important. If they cant do those things then they will likely leave and never have a chance to know what SL can be. ”
You can read the rest of Blue’s comment here…. http://brinda-benares.blogspot.com/2009/12/sadness-personified.html
We can all do as Blue did…or I do…one person at a time.
Salvatore Otoro has as good a solution as I think I’ve ever heard and one that would “scale”…..
Send them an Email and ask them simply…Why?
I’d be one of the mute. Actually, one place I worked a couple decades ago, they thought I was for about six months.
The strange thing is I dont remember my first few hours as all that hard. There were a bunch of people who joined pretty much at the same time and we ended up in hanja, where we sat and talked mostly (rose tinted hindsight). that went on for weeks as we went exploring and reported back in with our findings. hell i still talk to 20% of them after 3 years. maybe it is feeling “part of it”. as for the ugly av thing i didnt expect to turn into adonis hihi perhaps the proliferation of new grids and other multiworlds has upped peoples expectations.
on the other hand i do now tend to give any new manifestation a max of 5 minutes before launching a nasty email. the only one i didnt do that to was inworldz which is so much sl that its cheating
it might be that we are just not able to solve this problem – if it is one – from our standpoint. times change after all and we will never be noobs again.
It shouldn’t be that difficult for LL to find out what the problem is by means of researches. Either as Salvatore Otoro suggested or by means of qualitative market researches, which are a bit more expensive, of course – but can’t LL pay for them if retention is such a key problem? There are some companies which are specialized in qualitative researches mostly everywhere, so LL could hire someone in the US, someone in Europe and someone elsewhere to conduct those researches at least in 3 different places and see what people say about using SL, especially those who do not stay. I’m sure there are ways to do it and to form focus groups with some of those people, to conduct depth interviews with them, etc. Unless there is a problem that I’m not realizing now, I can’t see why LL cannot really know what the obstacles concerning user retention are. It doesn’t mean that those obstacles are easy to overcome.
mmm… how to comment without actually saying SL needs something like Xbox 360 Kinect hardware and a 56″ LCDHD screen ..(its just my latest pipe dream.)
It all depends, though, on what you want to increase the user-retention for. I, for example, might like to increase it simply ’cause there would be more people to talk to, more quickly. Linden Lab, doesnt care about me sitting round and talking to people, they want people to pour money into SL, they’re a business, they need to pay the bills, and turn a profit, and do whatever it is businesses do. Getting people to stay and chat and and then getting them to fork over there cash are two different problems.
But, come to think of it, why does the user-retention rate have to increase? We are told over and over that Linden Lab is in fine shape, SL is profitable, and if that is true, perhaps The Lab should be satisfied with the X out of 1000 new users that hang around till they get hooked and start pouring money into SL. (perhaps only X out of 1000 human beings on the planet (or on the internet) have their brains wired in the way that would get them hooked on SL in the first place) If the Labs business model, or business forecast, or whatever they are calling it these days, needs the rate of user-retention (or the total number of users) to grow exponentially to make a profit and the growth rate is in fact linear, it maybe be time to re-evaluate the business model and bring it into line with reality (oh wait didn’t they just sack a bunch of people) Linear growth isn’t that bad is it? I mean it’s still growth, isnt it? Exponential growth seems a little greedy to me anyway.
mmm …. greed
In very general terms I would say that most people are movivated by one or more of these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_deadly_sins
If Linden Lab wants to increase the user-retention rate they need to tempt people with the Seven Deadly.
damn I’ve made a suggestion.
As you told, the problem start with the problem. Lack of meaning, so why it is why? or shoulda say why does anyone worry about basics questions. Well “GOD” could answer, but he insist in doing whatever he wants going in a selfish path, believing that there still exist massive praying Avas, but why? When the truth is why does he exists? Well “god” can answer all this, or maybe can making so philosophical ways to engage their lost believers. Dump on the core make god lost the will of keep us virtually alive, so he is just doing something, just something…………. so boring no?
Obviously SL needs new users to stay at at least the same rate that natural attrition takes users away.
Mostly what gets to me is that there are all these people, and I feel like they’re missing out. If my own experiences are anything to go by, they are definitely missing out.
I can’t help but agree and really I’m quite surprised again and again at how badly the business side of SL is managed.
You would think that this particular question would be the very first that they would get answers to before spending millions on a new dodgy viewer, for example.
I came in, as Brinda says, with a poor computer, few skills, but enough stubbornness to make it work.
Top questions from genuine newcomers when I was more often at Oxbridge:
How do I play this game?
How can I make her/him walk/run/fly etc (speaking of the avatar in 3rd person)
How can I make money?
Many variations on asking for money or sex.
All variations on What is there to Do? and How do I do it?
There were a significant number of newcomers who expected people inworld to entertain them. They were not comfortable exploring on their own, and demanded that someone come show them pretty much everything in SL. This group would be one I would expect to leave soon and not come back. They were pretty much looking for a “quest”.
This is what folks were asking about in the “first hour”. I am not sure that dropping folks who cannot operate the avatar to walk or have any instructions in appropriate behaviour is a great idea. Seems like a recipe for frustration for both newcomers and those holding events that are suddenly gifted with new folks walking into everyone and bleating for help.
@soror Well, when Viewer 2 was in the design stages, the Lab said that they were conducting usability tests and so forth. Finding out what worked better, what didn’t work as well and so forth. I think it’s possible, however, that they didn’t conduct the same tests on their existing viewer – and thus the results would have been flawed, and the new viewer may not have rated any better than the old.
@Fogwoman I figure if they get far enough to actually start asking questions, we can count them as “survivors” of the first part of the new-user process. They’re the lucky ones, so to speak.
@Sean Lynch I don’t think ugly avatars and a dressing room feature are things that make people leave SL. I do agree with the others that part of the problem is the need for people come in expecting to have their hand held and to be told what to do. Sadly, Linden Labs doesn’t help matters with its ridiculous ads targeting young kids fixated on the Twilight craze. Those ads make SL seem like a game with groups completing quests and performing raids. It’s no wonder they need hand-holding and guidance.
When I arrived in SL 4 years ago, I adjusted quickly and knew that it was a place to unleash creativity in unique ways. I began socializing and exploring the grid with others. I don’t expect everyone to adjust to it as quickly as I did but to understand that it’s not another version of World of Warcraft nor some elaborate game. There are role play areas but that is only a part of what is in Second Life.
I can say that I made a character years ago and didn’t come back again because SL was so confusing for me. My girl was so ugly and it seemed extremely difficult to figure out how to make her look better. I think a huge problem for women is how ugly the avatars are. Sure, it’s nice to personalize them later but you need a good base to keep a girl interested. A better walk, A more professional look. I didn’t know there were free stores, how to search for them, or how to transport there well enough to stick around. That was back when the first world was more of a tutorial. I learned to drive over rats and fly around a building. The obstacle course was good for learning the ropes, but I think it could have been improved upon.
Now for men, my husband said that SL was just too boring. He signed on, went through this white tutorial that wasn’t as indepth or helpful as the first course I had gone to years before. He had no interest in returning to SL because there was nothing to do. He prefers games of action.
I think SL might consider making the newbie places more like a first tutorial level of a game. Really show what it’s about. And definitely put some surveys into place. If a newbie can’t tell you what’s wrong, how can you fix it?
Maybe the next advertisement for SL should not show a vampire
.
People who are interested in the vampire role sign up, log in and meet “No vampires, no biting” signs all over, hehe.
You could direct noobs quickly to appropriate gaming/RP areas, but other than Bloodliners who would enjoy biting some fresh necks, couldn’t that plan backfire? Do existing areas really want a group of untrained newcomers popping in and making those first-hour mistakes?
If Linden Lab better understood what potential new users want–game? romance? virtual fashion?–they could better target the product to these audiences.
But right now three adverts stick with me: the whitebread-vampire banner-ad, the “fall in love in fake Paris” video, and “Gigi goes shopping and becomes Marie Antoinette and a Ninja” vid.
I cannot imagine that too many newcomers find any of those experiences in as timely a manner as they expect they might. I’d disagree, however, with early respondents. The new stock avatars, while boringly human, are at least well done. Gone are the generic noob guy and Ruth, unless you crash hard and rezz as her
A combination of Phil L.’s “bringing newbies directly to content”, combined with a better help/tutorial system is what i think of.
Landing instantly at wanted content awakes interest and hopefully engages to further explore.
Under a better help system i understand no introduction tutorial that covers everything at once, since this is boring and too much at beginning.
Instead:
Menu->Help->
…1.Learn to move: movement, driving, sit-TP, map and teleport, landmarks,…
…2.Learn interaction: ‘Touch thing’ can do a lot. Thing wants to animate you ? How to buy and unpack ?
…3.Improve yourself. Shape, skin, cloth and prim attachments.
…4.Start your career: How to create a table with 5 prims and set it for sale.
@Tateru Nino
“Obviously SL needs new users to stay at at least the same rate that natural attrition takes users away.”
Oh, but does it? .. The only real value of a new basic free account user to the Lab is to get the person “off the street and in the door” and to the point where their money starts to flow into SL. I’ve read somewhere (from a T.Linden post I think it was) that it usually takes 3 to 6 months for a user to start pouring money into SL. (and indeed it took me 3 months to start) After that 3 to 6 month period basic accounts, if they haven’t started to pour money into SL, can be seen as, well, leeches. (cause they aren’t contributing to the running costs of SL and actually to increase their numbers beyond a certain point may be a bad thing) Its just that all users aren’t of equal value, thats all. From X amount of new users, you’ll get Y amount of premium accounts and from those you’ll get Z amount of tier payers and merchants and whatnot. If you could get more premium accounts, and tier payers, out of the existent number of new users you would not have to increase the user-retention rate at all, total numbers of users could, in fact, shrink below the natural attrition rate for a time if the money contributed by the total user base stayed roughly the same. (in other words, the problems of increasing new user-retention might not be so dire as one thinks)
I dont actually think anything is obvious, take this obsession with “new users” which really actually annoys me, as does the associated assumpution that it would be fantastic for SL to take over the world. At the time of the v2 release Lindens were running round saying they could “see the day” when SL had a concurrency of 8 million, or some other equally ridiculous figure. Of these 8 million how many were going to be freeloading basic accounts? Who was going to pay for them? How far would premium account fees have to rise to subsidise the 8 million facebookers that were going log on. Did anyone even think to ask? It was assumed that, even as The Lab cast its net wider and wider for new users there would always be enough paying customers to cover them. The Lab went merrily on its way making things “better” for the new users it imagined would show up, at the expense and sometimes to the great annoyance of the existing, paying, customers, because The Lab’s studies showed once customers got to a certain age they were very slow to leave, (easy to push them around, move them to zindra, they wont leave, stick an idiotic viewer in their faces they wont leave..etc ..etc.. they may not leave but they’ll change their habits and make it rather difficult for you to retain any new users that may happen along in whats now being mumbled about as a “push back”) And when The Lab’s imaginary new friends didnt materialise? Then there was a problem…… but I’m ranting
@Tateru Nino
“But without data, we’re just rolling dice”
Ah, but, its fun to roll a dice, is it not? Which brings me back to the seven deadly sins. If someone wants to sell a socket set there’s a reason that they stand a girl in a bikini next to it. Lust, sex sells, why is it that The lab can’t bring itself to advertise the sexy side of SL? There’s a reason why people waste their money gambling, theyre greedy, didnt that anti gambling thing get set aside? and so on and so forth, through all seven, appeal to the base nature of humanity and you’ll get more new users than you know what to do with, (regardless of lag or crashes or ugly viewers) half of them may be wandering round shouting “I want the sex” but as long as they’re paying customers everyone will be happy.
Well, ultimately, if ordinary attrition isn’t replaced by at least equal numbers, the population will eventually approach zero — and that’s without any especial events that might cause users to rethink their participation.
Assuming the platform and policies were perfectly adapted for retention of existing users, the population would still continue to slide in the absence of new users. Life is complicated. Quite a few of us are elderly, and life expectancy isn’t great. Occasionally people have a clash with another user that causes them to withdraw.
Whatever the reason, the existing population inevitably declines. Only by replacing those inevitable losses does the platform remain viable to operate (and simultaneously viable for the percentage of those users who create content).
Since – thus far – it’s been the users and not Linden Lab who seem to have the most effect on the retention of new users, I think it is a matter that bears consideration, even if only as an abstract exercise.
@Tateru Nino
“Well, ultimately, if ordinary attrition isn’t replaced by at least equal numbers, the population will eventually approach zero”
hehe … thats why a said could “for a time” a fall could not be sustained forever.
“thus far – it’s been the users and not Linden Lab who seem to have the most effect on the retention of new users”
agreed .. makes a note to be nice to a newbie this week
Second Life is like smoking. You start off not knowing why anyone would ever do it. It makes you cough. It gives you headaches. It’s messy and smelly and can be expensive. But if you have friends who do it, eventually you get used to it, and then you get addicted and can’t quit.
Now if as many people quit smoking as quit Second Life, we’d be making some real progress in the world.
Maybe someone said it, but I didn’t see it:
The system requirements for registration are different from those required to actually access the service. With the feature-creep in the browser interface, it’s entirely possible that someone who was able to login six months ago no longer can.
Oh hell. It’s not possible. It’s happened to me, repeatedly. Now yes, I can go out and find the latest NVIDIA driver, update and then debug whatever else LL means when they say that my system doesn’t meet their minimums (even though my specs are double), or I can say “screw it, I’ll go play something else”.
All I’m saying is: design your software like your entire client-base bought their computer three years ago and haven’t updated since.
Is the Lab able to discern wether these are actual attempts of new users to sign up – or existing users checking what new names are available? I’m way more aware of that JOIN button since they dropped the “remember me” log on.
Hard to say. I’m not sure if the difference can be told.
Simple reason actionly in my opinion… they just don’t understand anything about the policies and such there. And then too, you have to think about that over half the grid is already alts or bots of another account.
Frankly I left there and found it hard like smoking to quit, but I did it in such a way to make it so I can’t go back as the same avatar…
For some residents that start in SL they are one not sure if they want to spend RL money in there and two aren’t sure if they can do anything there… SL has 5 things people do, and 3 of which are adult oriented… the other 2 are socialize and build… building many feel they can’t do (and why do it when Linden Research Inc. technically will own it), Socializing, well that gets boring fast…
People would rather have a story to follow and a real game environment in some cases… then too its not the viewer for the most part but the graphics of SL and the nature of the actual SL environment. It’s not designed well for one and yet you have people trying to say its the best thing since the pizza was first made. LOL