SOOW2018
Hiding the blockchain
We built on Ethereum and made sure nobody using it had to know.
The situation
Building a consumer rewards app on Ethereum. The team wanted to lead with the technology because it was defensible and novel.
The obvious move
"We're a blockchain company." Lead with the tech in marketing, onboarding, and product.
What I did instead
Made a deliberate decision to make the blockchain invisible to users. Points just worked. The Ethereum wallet was there but nobody needed to know. The design instinct was: surface the value, hide the plumbing.
What happened
70% of test users said they'd connect their bank account on signup. No barriers introduced by the blockchain patterns. Every project I've seen since that led with "we're a blockchain company" has struggled.