Contribution flow overhaul [SHAPING]

[BenJam]

Overview

The current experience of contributing to a project feels fragmented and confusing, described as such by some of our users, for example:

"I know you are doing good work. I just found the website hard to use when I donated money to a project once."

Given that the main layout and steps process have never been updated, it seems that a complete overhaul is needed to update this as one of our main features on the fundraising side.

Some of the specific challenges that we have identified as confusion factors are:

• It is sometimes hard to know what are you specifically contributing to, if it's a project or event or a goal.
• You can get lost between the steps and wrap your head around the process quickly in order to complete the contribution in less time.

Assessments and previews issues

• Provide a solution for “checks” as a payment method in the contribution flow
• Allow users to download an Invoice of their donation directly from the platform
• Collective admins need access to contributor email for followup communications
• In the contribution process make it clear who the tip goes to, and what it is for.
• Provide collective admins with contributor churn information
• https://github.com/opencollective/opencollective/issues/7110

Desired outcomes

• We are able to define a fundraising strategy using the contribution flow as its main feature
• There are clear steps that we can implement as the new contribution flow
• We have clear goals for the contribution flow, based on why contributors move forward and also what collective admins need to level up their fundraising game.

Scope

1. Workshop session to review main issues and generate ideas together

• Collective review of the contribution flow
• Goals of the contribution flow (Fundraising strategy piece)
• Platform tips in the contribution flow
• Layout review

2. Design prototype and testing with a small user base

3. Pitch an implementation project for the following sprint

[Memo-Es]

After the first round of shaping, we tracked back the challenges from this project and #7223 and formulated an analysis of our fundraising strategy as a whole.

We articulated a proposal for remodeling Open Collective's fundraising features. Since it entails a paradigm shift in the current structure, we are pausing the design phase of this project until we bring the new model proposal to the team's attention. We want feedback and collective discussion on this topic before making any design decisions; we can still use this issue to record the next phase, and switch the status label from [SHAPING] to [DESIGN]