Connecting retail investors to renewable energy mining facilities in a simple, fully managed experience

Summary

is a venture that works in the cross-section between renewables, Bitcoin mining, and SaaS. Sazmining connects retail investors to renewable energy mining facilities in a simple, fully managed experience. Our vision is to transform how people relate to money and energy. As part of an ambitious project to design a first-of-its-kind user experience, we collaborated with AJ&Smart, a product team that has worked with high-profile companies like Slack, Dropbox, Twitter, and TikTok. With our combined efforts, we were able to create a product that exceeded our expectations and delivered a seamless experience to our customers.

My Role

As a member of a dynamic Series A startup, I wore many hats to ensure the success of the product. Initially hired as a product manager, I later took on the additional role of product designer to develop the design system and carry out designs for future features. My responsibilities included:
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- Conducting customer discovery through 1:1 interviews, case studies, and focus groups to gain insights into our target audience.
- Contributing to the sourcing, vetting, and hiring of engineers to build a high-performing team.
- Completing and documenting design sprints for the MVP product, including conducting customer interviews, user testing, UI designs, and design specifications.
- Documenting the MVP database design, technical architecture, mining infrastructure, and technical trade-offs from the engineering team and communicating it to the broader team.
Developing a customer journey map to understand how people find out about our product, develop a need, sign up, and purchase.
- Creating internal documentation for our team to ensure everyone was aligned and on the same page, including sprint documentation.

My diverse skill set and willingness to take on different responsibilities allowed me to contribute significantly to the success of the company and helped us achieve our goals.

Creating a “Coinbase user experience” for the complex activity of Bitcoin Mining

Pain Points

At the outset, we targeted early adopters who were already mining Bitcoin and collaborated with them to identify pain points related to remote and at-home mining. Our findings were as follows:

For remote mining
Cloud mining was deemed untrustworthy
Competitors lacked transparency
Poor uptime was an issue
Deployments were frequently delayed for several months

For at-home mining
Units were expensive without bulk purchasing
Finding affordable electricity and infrastructure was a challenge
Noise levels were high
Fire hazards were a concern
Security was an issue

To address these pain points, we established a set of guiding principles that emphasized the importance of not only developing the right product but also being able to sell it effectively. This led us to devote equal attention to product testing and marketing, ensuring that our efforts were focused on delivering a product that met the needs of our target audience while also being easy to sell.

Our Approach

Our approach involved a customer-centric focus from the outset, with a focus on two key elements:

Customer Discovery
To develop our customer personas, we conducted 12 customer discovery interviews with potential customers identified through Twitter and in-person at the Bitcoin Miami event. Based on these interviews, we developed our product vision and MVP concept.

Agile Product Strategy and Design
Given the novelty and complexity of our offering, we recognized the importance of keeping our customers closely involved throughout the research and design process. To achieve this, we conducted weekly customer sessions every Friday, with the specific focus and format varying depending on the stage of each feature of the MVP. By taking this approach, we were able to remain agile and responsive to our customers' needs, while also ensuring that our product design remained on track and aligned with our overall vision.

How we used automation and data to face product strategy challenges head on.

Not your average SaaS product

As a team, we faced unique challenges that went beyond the typical obstacles encountered by a SaaS company. This was largely due to the fact that we were dealing with physical spaces, machines, and energy - all of which added a layer of complexity to our operations. In order to develop a product strategy that balanced organizational success and customer happiness, we tackled a number of these challenges head on.

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Not your average SaaS product

One of the major challenges in the Bitcoin mining industry is the volatility of mining rig prices, which can fluctuate rapidly due to changes in market demand and supply(+- $10,000 per rig). To address this challenge, we developed automated processes to adjust pricing and supply across the platform on a weekly basis. This involved closely monitoring market trends and data, and using predictive algorithms to forecast future pricing and supply needs. Based on these forecasts, the company was able to automatically adjust pricing and supply levels in real-time, ensuring that customers always had access to the latest and most competitive prices on mining rigs. Additionally, the automated processes helped to reduce the risk of overstocking or understocking inventory, allowing Sazmining to operate more efficiently and effectively. By developing these automated processes, the company was able to navigate the volatility of the mining rig market, and provide customers with a stable and reliable platform for their mining needs.

Budgeting & burnrate

As a product manager at Sazmining, managing budgeting and burnrate required the use of agile methodologies to ensure that resources were being allocated effectively and efficiently. This involved closely monitoring the progress of development efforts, and regularly re-evaluating priorities and timelines to ensure that we were making the most of our available resources. By using agile methodologies, we were able to quickly adapt to changing market conditions and customer needs, while still staying within our budget constraints. Additionally, we leveraged data-driven insights to optimize our product development process, which helped us to identify areas for improvement and minimize unnecessary expenditures. Through these efforts, we were able to successfully manage budgeting and burnrate at Sazmining, ultimately contributing to the company's growth and success as a Series A startup.

Optimizing the path to purchase flow

To improve the purchase flow for a business-to-consumer Bitcoin mining company, several steps were taken to make the process seamless and easy for customers, resulting in increased conversions and order sizes. First, the checkout process was simplified by reducing the number of steps required and making it more intuitive. Second, the payment options were expanded to include various cryptocurrencies, making it more convenient for customers who prefer to use alternative forms of payment. Third, a live chat support system was implemented, allowing customers to quickly and easily get help with any issues or questions they may have during the purchase process. Finally, the website was optimized for mobile devices, ensuring that customers could make purchases from anywhere, at any time. These improvements resulted in a more streamlined and user-friendly purchase flow, ultimately leading to higher conversion rates and larger order sizes for the Bitcoin mining company.

Designing intuitive navigation

In order to improve engagement and reduce the number of clicks required to take action on Sazmining’s marketing website and Platform the navigation was constantly iterated upon. First, user data was analyzed to identify the most frequently accessed pages and features, as well as any pain points or bottlenecks in the existing navigation structure. Based on this analysis, the navigation was redesigned to be more intuitive and user-friendly, with clear labels and easy-to-find links to the most important pages and actions. This included consolidating multiple menus into a single, streamlined navigation bar, and prominently featuring calls to action such as "Start Mining" and "Join the Community". A/B testing was conducted to validate the effectiveness of the new navigation design, with metrics such as engagement and click-through rates closely monitored and analyzed.

A simple but powerful dashboard

A simple but powerful mining dashboard was developed that allowed customers to feel like miners without the stress and challenges of Bitcoin mining. The dashboard was designed with a clean and intuitive interface, making it easy for customers to access and understand key information about their mining activities, such as hashrate, energy usage, and earnings. To further enhance the user experience, the dashboard provides real-time notifications and alerts to keep customers informed about important updates and changes in the mining process. By providing a powerful yet simplified dashboard, customers were able to engage with the mining process and feel like they were a part of it, without the stress and complexity of mining themselves. This resulted in a more engaging and satisfying experience for customers, and ultimately contributed to increased loyalty and retention.