The Franklin Institute Membership
TFI website
2024
Kalamuna
Partner
The Franklin Institute
Sole UX/UI designer
Overview
The Franklin Institute (TFI) is a leading science museum in Philadelphia, providing programs and resources for a wide range of visitor groups. This project focused on redesigning Memberships sections to improve the user journey, deliver clearer, more actionable information to increase conversions.
ChallengeThe previous pages had a complex page structure and lacked a strong value message, making it difficult and redundant for users to navigate.
- Membership benefits, tiers, and pricing were difficult to compare at a glance when same content repeated each sub pages.
-
CTAs were scattered across the page, disrupting the conversion flow.
Membership user flowWhen we mapped the membership user flow, it became clear that the membership landing page was not being used effectively. Key information was fragmented and partially duplicated across the Join, Renew, Gift Membership, and Membership Benefits subpages, often with slight variations. This inconsistency created confusion and forced users to jump back and forth between pages to compare details, increasing effort and friction in the decision-making process.
DATA ANALYSIS
Core Problem & Root CauseMembership-related information is scattered across multiple subpages, making it difficult for users to quickly understand the value of the membership or decide what action to take. This fragmentation breaks the continuity of the journey toward joining or renewing a membership, resulting in unnecessary friction and drop-off.
Supporting EvidenceAnalytics reveal significant drop-off across the /membership subpages. For example, /membership/join receives 15,154 views with an average engagement time of only 46 seconds, indicating high initial interest but little deeper exploration.
Additionally, users frequently navigate back and forth between the membership pages and other sections such as /plan-your-visit and /exhibits-and-experiences. This behavior suggests that users are seeking additional context—such as visit frequency, value comparisons, or benefits—outside the membership section in order to make a decision.
A similar pattern appears when users move from membership subpages to the shopping cart and then return again, indicating they may not be finding the information they need or are unsure about their decision—forcing them to re-gather information across multiple pages.
UX OpportunitiesThe data clearly points to an opportunity to:
Consolidate the fragmented membership content into a single, comprehensive landing page (Join / Renew / Benefits / Gift).
-
Surface contextual membership value across high-traffic pages, helping users connect their current behavior with potential savings or benefits.
-
Introduce quick comparison in one chart.
-
Improve CTA clarity and hierarchy to guide users toward a clear path to joining or renewing or gifting.
-
Simplify the membership sign-up flow to reduce friction and support a smoother transition.
These improvements would strengthen the overall membership conversion funnel by helping users understand value faster and make confident decisions.
FINAL DESIGN AND OUTCOME
Designing a Unified Membership Experience
I consolidated the fragmented membership tables and details that were spread across multiple subpages into a single, focused membership landing page. This gives visitors one clear place to understand plans, pricing, and benefits. Because the comparison tables were complex, I iterated on their layout multiple times to ensure they are easy to scan and interact with on mobile (that 51% of user access from) without overwhelming users.
To recover traffic that was previously dropping off from the membership section, I also introduced banners and clear membership CTAs on high-intent pages such as Plan Your Visit and Exhibits & Experiences. These contextual entry points encourage visitors to naturally consider membership options at the moments when value is most relevant.
Conclusion
&ReflectionBy redesigning the end-to-end user flow and overall UX of the membership experience, we increased conversion from the membership landing page to the join (shopping cart) page by roughly 150%, about 2.5× the previous rate.
In addition, the new contextual banners and CTAs on high-intent pages such as Plan Your Visit and Exhibits & Experiences drove an extra 50–65% uplift in traffic to the membership flow, surfaces that had previously contributed very little.