How FirstCry uses Mixpanel to optimize user engagement and drive business growth

FirstCry is a pioneer in multi-channel retailing for Mothers’, Babies’, and Kids’ products in India. Its platform includes an online presence via a mobile app and website, modern stores and general trade retail distribution. FirstCry offers a wide range of products, including apparel, footwear, baby gear, nursery, diapers, toys, and personal care. By June 2023, the platform featured over one million SKUs from 6,800+ brands, including prominent Indian and global names, alongside its own home brands. Additionally, the FirstCry app has been downloaded over 104 million times in India as of June 2023.

While FirstCry had a strong data infrastructure for major business decisions, it lacked clear insights into user behavior within its mobile app. This gap made it challenging for the product and marketing teams to optimize the user experience effectively. Additionally, with the impending sunset of Google Analytics properties, FirstCry needed a more robust, comprehensive analytics solution to handle its evolving needs. The goal was to track granular user behavior, optimize conversions, and drive better decision-making across teams.

At FirstCry, data is at the heart of every key decision, driving the company’s strategy across various functions. While their database provided valuable insights for larger business decisions, the teams struggled to gain a deep understanding of user behavior within their app. Given the heavy reliance on app usage for their business, obtaining in-depth behavioral insights became essential for optimizing the user experience and driving growth.

During their evaluation of various analytics tools, Mixpanel stood out as the clear solution for FirstCry. It offered a seamless experience, allowing teams to quickly generate reports, analyze user funnels, and map user journeys. Mixpanel’s most significant advantage was its ability to process data in real-time with just a few clicks, enabling FirstCry to derive insights and take action much faster.

FirstCry implemented a structured onboarding approach with tailored training sessions for each department to ensure a smooth transition and maximize adoption. As a result, Mixpanel quickly became integral to their analytics strategy, with each team leveraging its capabilities to drive performance improvements.

• Marketing Team: Leveraged Mixpanel’s Insights and Funnel Reports to track banner click-through rates (CTRs), analyze peak engagement times, and optimize promotional strategies based on real-time performance data.

• Technology Team: Used Mixpanel to monitor user behavior, identify crash points, and quickly resolve technical issues, leading to faster problem resolution and an improved user experience.

Funnel optimization and signup success

One of the most significant outcomes FirstCry experienced through Mixpanel was optimizing its signup process. Before using Mixpanel, the team struggled with identifying specific drop-off points in its signup funnel, leading to suboptimal conversion rates. By utilizing Mixpanel’s Funnel Reports, FirstCry could track each step of the signup journey in detail.

Through granular analysis, the team identified a rare but impactful issue: an OTP (One-Time Password) verification error was causing a significant drop-off, particularly at specific times of the day when traffic was higher. This data was previously difficult to pinpoint without Mixpanel’s real-time insights. Armed with this information, the product team optimized the OTP retry mechanism and improved session handling. As a result, FirstCry saw a 15% increase in the signup success rate, which directly contributed to a 5% boost in new sales conversions.

Nilang Patel, General Manager Product at FirstCry, noted: “Mixpanel’s ability to give us detailed insights into user behavior helped us identify the exact point where users were facing friction. By quickly addressing the OTP verification issue, we improved our signup success rate and saw a direct impact on conversions. We couldn’t have made such fast changes without Mixpanel’s real-time insights.”

Understanding behavioral and purchase patterns across user tiers

With FirstCry’s diverse customer base across India and the Middle East, understanding regional differences in purchasing behavior was crucial. Mixpanel’s Funnel Analysis and Segmentation capabilities provided FirstCry with in-depth insights into how users behaved based on their geographic tier, which is a common practice in India where cities are categorized as Tier 1 (major metropolitan areas), Tier 2 (smaller cities), and Tier 3/4 (rural areas).

By using Mixpanel’s segmentation tools, FirstCry was able to break down user behavior based on these tiers and observe distinct patterns. For example, they found that users from Tier 1 cities (such as Mumbai and Delhi) exhibited a much higher conversion rate compared to those from Tier 3 and Tier 4 cities. One key observation was that while Tier 3 and Tier 4 users were adding products to their cart at similar or even higher rates than Tier 1 users, they were less likely to complete their purchases.

Through Mixpanel’s Cohort Analysis, FirstCry could track users’ behavior across multiple touchpoints and interactions, such as login rates, cart-to-order ratios, and coupon usage. The data showed that the lower conversion rate among Tier 3 and Tier 4 users was primarily due to fewer “Add to Cart” actions. With this valuable insight, FirstCry was able to tailor the user experience for different user segments, resulting in improved conversion rates.

As Malvi Modi, Senior Data Analyst at FirstCry, explained: “Mixpanel’s ability to break down data by tiers and user behavior allowed us to identify patterns that weren’t obvious at first glance. By understanding how Tier 3 and Tier 4 users behaved differently, we could optimize the experience for these users, leading to better conversion rates.”

Technical optimizations based on device and mobile data analysis

FirstCry’s tech team used Mixpanel’s Device Analytics and Funnel Analysis to identify and address specific technical issues impacting conversion rates across different mobile devices. Using Mixpanel’s Lookup Tables and device-level breakdowns, they identified several devices with significantly higher drop-off rates during critical steps in the user journey, such as during product page views or the checkout process.

By isolating data related to specific mobile devices and analyzing how users interacted with the app on those devices, the team was able to pinpoint areas of the app that were underperforming on lower-cost devices, which often have slower processing power or less memory. This insight led the team to optimize app performance for these specific devices by improving the app’s loading time and simplifying some of the more complex interactions that were causing issues.

As a result of these optimizations, FirstCry saw a 3-5% improvement in conversion rates for users on the affected devices. Additionally, the app’s transitions from the product listing pages (PLP) to the product detail pages (PDP) were streamlined, leading to better user retention and a smoother overall experience.

Patel shared: “We were able to spot the exact devices where users were struggling with the app, and by optimizing the performance for those devices, we immediately saw improvements in conversions. This level of insight and speed of action has been invaluable for us.”

Accelerating innovation and data-driven decision-making

With Mixpanel, FirstCry was able to break down user behavior into actionable insights. The team could now monitor feature performance in real-time, significantly reducing the time required for product iterations. According to Patel, “what used to take a few months now takes just a few weeks. Mixpanel has enabled us to assess feature performance and impact on key metrics almost immediately.”

This speed and accuracy have been crucial for improving both user experience and business performance. For instance, in one of their strategic initiatives, FirstCry tested the introduction of convenience charges based on pin codes. Mixpanel’s detailed insights allowed them to split test the initiative (control vs. non-control groups) and assess its impact on conversion rates for each pin code. This data-driven approach helped them roll out the feature across India without sacrificing growth, saving months of analysis and testing.

Looking ahead, FirstCry plans to use Mixpanel even more extensively. In addition to optimizing product features and tech performance, the company increasingly relies on Mixpanel for marketing campaigns and experimentation. Teams can now run detailed experiments on campaign banners, offers, and promotional placements, optimizing click-to-purchase ratios in real-time.

As FirstCry continues to scale, they see Mixpanel playing a pivotal role in providing actionable insights that will drive both product innovation and business growth.