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Client
Yes Bank
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Service
UX & Product Design
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Industry
Banking & Financial Services
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Company Size
25,000+
The client
One of India’s prominent private sector banks — serving retail and commercial customers across an extensive branch network and a growing digital banking platform — was losing a significant proportion of prospective digital customers during the account opening journey. In India’s intensely competitive digital banking landscape, where customers can abandon an onboarding flow in seconds and open an account with a competitor in minutes, the quality of the digital onboarding experience had become a direct determinant of customer acquisition cost and market share.
The problem
Yes Bank’s digital account opening journey was converting below its potential — not because of product limitations, but because the UX had not kept pace with the expectations of digitally native Indian customers who compared every banking interaction against the best consumer digital experiences available to them. Long, unintuitive onboarding flows, KYC processes feeling antiquated, and the absence of resume-capable journeys were systematically suppressing conversion rates that determined the economics of the bank’s digital acquisition programme.
- Lengthy and Unintuitive Account Opening Journey for Indian Customers — The digital account opening process was too long and insufficiently intuitive — requiring customers to navigate multiple screens, provide information in non-obvious sequences, and complete a KYC process averaging 30 minutes. At every unnecessary friction point, a proportion of applicants abandoned the journey entirely.
- Lack of Guidance Creating Friction for New and Returning Users — The journey provided insufficient contextual guidance for first-time applicants and returning users who had previously dropped off — leaving users to navigate complex KYC requirements without adequate explanation, and failing to make it easy for partially completed applications to resume from where they had been left.
- 30-Minute KYC Process Causing High Abandonment at Critical Stage — The 30-minute average KYC completion time was above the threshold at which a significant proportion of digitally native Indian customers were willing to commit — particularly when the onboarding experience did not communicate the value they would receive in exchange for that investment of time and effort.
OUR SOLUTION
Worxwide conducted competitive research to benchmark industry best practices in digital banking onboarding across India and global markets, and redesigned the account opening workflow to be simpler, more responsive, and more intuitive — with contextual help available at every step. A resume-from-where-you-left-off capability was implemented for users dropping off mid-journey. A personalised product selection journey made the onboarding experience more engaging and reduced the generic, transactional feel that had characterised the previous design.
- Competitive Research-Grounded Onboarding Redesign for Indian Banking — Systematic benchmarking of digital banking onboarding best practices across India and global markets identified the specific design patterns — progressive information collection, contextual help, smart defaults, and streamlined KYC flows — that the leading digital banks used to reduce abandonment and improve completion rates.
- Resume-Capable Journey Addressing Mid-Flow Abandonment — A resume-from-where-you-left-off capability addressed one of the most significant conversion gaps in the existing journey — enabling users who had abandoned mid-flow to return and complete their application without starting again. This single feature had an outsized impact on overall completion rates.
- Personalised Product Selection and Contextual Help at Every Step — A personalised product selection journey replaced the generic account type menu with a guided discovery experience — and contextual help at each step reduced the uncertainty and confusion that had previously driven abandonment by users who needed guidance but were not offered it.
Our work in action
The Impact
15% Reduction in Onboarding Drop-Off Rate Across Digital Channels
The cumulative impact of simplified workflows, resume capability, and improved contextual guidance reduced the proportion of applicants abandoning the account opening journey by 15% — directly improving the economics of Yes Bank’s digital acquisition programme across India.
Improved Account Opening Conversion Rate for Yes
Fewer drop-offs at each stage of the redesigned journey translated directly into a higher overall account opening conversion rate — improving the return on Yes Bank’s digital marketing and acquisition investment across the Indian banking market.
Better User Experience Driving Digital Banking Adoption in
A more intuitive, supportive onboarding experience created a stronger first impression of Yes Bank’s digital banking platform — setting a more positive expectation for the ongoing customer relationship and improving early product engagement among newly onboarded customers.
