#Product Engineer

[staff]

Tumblr’s Core Product Strategy

Here at Tumblr, we’ve been working hard on reorganizing how we work in a bid to gain more users. A larger user base means a more sustainable company, and means we get to stick around and do this thing with you all a bit longer. What follows is the strategy we're using to accomplish the goal of user growth. The @labs group has published a bit already, but this is bigger. We’re publishing it publicly for the first time, in an effort to work more transparently with all of you in the Tumblr community. This strategy provides guidance amid limited resources, allowing our teams to focus on specific key areas to ensure Tumblr’s future.

The Diagnosis

In order for Tumblr to grow, we need to fix the core experience that makes Tumblr a useful place for users. The underlying problem is that Tumblr is not easy to use. Historically, we have expected users to curate their feeds and lean into curating their experience. But this expectation introduces friction to the user experience and only serves a small portion of our audience. 

Tumblr’s competitive advantage lies in its unique content and vibrant communities. As the forerunner of internet culture, Tumblr encompasses a wide range of interests, such as entertainment, art, gaming, fandom, fashion, and music. People come to Tumblr to immerse themselves in this culture, making it essential for us to ensure a seamless connection between people and content. 

To guarantee Tumblr’s continued success, we’ve got to prioritize fostering that seamless connection between people and content. This involves attracting and retaining new users and creators, nurturing their growth, and encouraging frequent engagement with the platform.

Our Guiding Principles

To enhance Tumblr’s usability, we must address these core guiding principles.

Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Retain and grow our creator base.

Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Improve the platform’s performance, stability, and quality.

Below is a deep dive into each of these principles.

Principle 1: Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Tumblr has a “top of the funnel” issue in converting non-users into engaged logged-in users. We also have not invested in industry standard SEO practices to ensure a robust top of the funnel. The referral traffic that we do get from external sources is dispersed across different pages with inconsistent user experiences, which results in a missed opportunity to convert these users into regular Tumblr users. For example, users from search engines often land on pages within the blog network and blog view—where there isn’t much of a reason to sign up. 

We need to experiment with logged-out tumblr.com to ensure we are capturing the highest potential conversion rate for visitors into sign-ups and log-ins. We might want to explore showing the potential future user the full breadth of content that Tumblr has to offer on our logged-out pages. We want people to be able to easily understand the potential behind Tumblr without having to navigate multiple tabs and pages to figure it out. Our current logged-out explore page does very little to help users understand “what is Tumblr.” which is a missed opportunity to get people excited about joining the site.

Actions & Next Steps

Improving Tumblr’s search engine optimization (SEO) practices to be in line with industry standards.

Experiment with logged out tumblr.com to achieve the highest conversion rate for sign-ups and log-ins, explore ways for visitors to “get” Tumblr and entice them to sign up.

Principle 2: Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

We need to ensure the highest quality user experience by presenting fresh and relevant content tailored to the user’s diverse interests during each session. If the user has a bad content experience, the fault lies with the product.

The default position should always be that the user does not know how to navigate the application. Additionally, we need to ensure that when people search for content related to their interests, it is easily accessible without any confusing limitations or unexpected roadblocks in their journey.

Being a 15-year-old brand is tough because the brand carries the baggage of a person’s preconceived impressions of Tumblr. On average, a user only sees 25 posts per session, so the first 25 posts have to convey the value of Tumblr: it is a vibrant community with lots of untapped potential. We never want to leave the user believing that Tumblr is a place that is stale and not relevant. 

Actions & Next Steps

Deliver great content each time the app is opened.

Make it easier for users to understand where the vibrant communities on Tumblr are. 

Improve our algorithmic ranking capabilities across all feeds. 

Principle 3: Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Part of Tumblr’s charm lies in its capacity to showcase the evolution of conversations and the clever remarks found within reblog chains and replies. Engaging in these discussions should be enjoyable and effortless.

Unfortunately, the current way that conversations work on Tumblr across replies and reblogs is confusing for new users. The limitations around engaging with individual reblogs, replies only applying to the original post, and the inability to easily follow threaded conversations make it difficult for users to join the conversation.

Actions & Next Steps

Address the confusion within replies and reblogs.

Improve the conversational posting features around replies and reblogs. 

Allow engagements on individual replies and reblogs.

Make it easier for users to follow the various conversation paths within a reblog thread. 

Remove clutter in the conversation by collapsing reblog threads. 

Explore the feasibility of removing duplicate reblogs within a user’s Following feed. 

Principle 4: Retain and grow our creator base.

Creators are essential to the Tumblr community. However, we haven’t always had a consistent and coordinated effort around retaining, nurturing, and growing our creator base.  

Being a new creator on Tumblr can be intimidating, with a high likelihood of leaving or disappointment upon sharing creations without receiving engagement or feedback. We need to ensure that we have the expected creator tools and foster the rewarding feedback loops that keep creators around and enable them to thrive.

The lack of feedback stems from the outdated decision to only show content from followed blogs on the main dashboard feed (“Following”), perpetuating a cycle where popular blogs continue to gain more visibility at the expense of helping new creators. To address this, we need to prioritize supporting and nurturing the growth of new creators on the platform.

It is also imperative that creators, like everyone on Tumblr, feel safe and in control of their experience. Whether it be an ask from the community or engagement on a post, being successful on Tumblr should never feel like a punishing experience.

Actions & Next Steps

Get creators’ new content in front of people who are interested in it. 

Improve the feedback loop for creators, incentivizing them to continue posting.

Build mechanisms to protect creators from being spammed by notifications when they go viral.

Expand ways to co-create content, such as by adding the capability to embed Tumblr links in posts.

Principle 5: Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Push notifications and emails are essential tools to increase user engagement, improve user retention, and facilitate content discovery. Our strategy of reaching out to you, the user, should be well-coordinated across product, commercial, and marketing teams.

Our messaging strategy needs to be personalized and adapt to a user’s shifting interests. Our messages should keep users in the know on the latest activity in their community, as well as keeping Tumblr top of mind as the place to go for witty takes and remixes of the latest shows and real-life events.  

Most importantly, our messages should be thoughtful and should never come across as spammy.  

Actions & Next Steps

Conduct an audit of our messaging strategy.

Address the issue of notifications getting too noisy; throttle, collapse or mute notifications where necessary.  

Identify opportunities for personalization within our email messages. 

Test what the right daily push notification limit is. 

Send emails when a user has push notifications switched off.

Principle 6: Performance, stability and quality.

The stability and performance of our mobile apps have declined. There is a large backlog of production issues, with more bugs created than resolved over the last 300 days. If this continues, roughly one new unresolved production issue will be created every two days. Apps and backend systems that work well and don't crash are the foundation of a great Tumblr experience. Improving performance, stability, and quality will help us achieve sustainable operations for Tumblr.

Improve performance and stability: deliver crash-free, responsive, and fast-loading apps on Android, iOS, and web.

Improve quality: deliver the highest quality Tumblr experience to our users. 

Move faster: provide APIs and services to unblock core product initiatives and launch new features coming out of Labs.

Conclusion

Our mission has always been to empower the world’s creators. We are wholly committed to ensuring Tumblr evolves in a way that supports our current users while improving areas that attract new creators, artists, and users. You deserve a digital home that works for you. You deserve the best tools and features to connect with your communities on a platform that prioritizes the easy discoverability of high-quality content. This is an invigorating time for Tumblr, and we couldn’t be more excited about our current strategy.

[nitor-infotech]

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[hiehq]

[ariadne-mouse]

This feels like both a statement of potential obviousness, but also a prediction because hey, we're only 2.5 hrs into Episode 1: I don't think Downfall will reveal either the gods or the Aeorians to somehow be uniquely evil, or that the desire on either part to destroy the other is somehow uniquely more justified or deserved.

Like in Episode 1 here we're getting a very strong dose of the shitty things Aeorians are doing to other mortals in their pursuit of control and power - we already knew they were a warmongering surveillance state, and as things get worse on Exandria it's grimly unsurprising that the people on the ground are increasingly treated as disposable. But Aeor is still a city full of people seeking safety in a land torn open by the gods' battles, desperate to survive by any (increasingly ugly and sinister) means. And the gods in turn are afraid for their survival, and are acting accordingly in seeking Aeor's Downfall (immense collateral damage) - all while and the versions of them in the party here have lived mortal lives & hardships, have families, communities. They have lived in the desolation their own godly battles have created. We don't see them portrayed as lofty divine abstracts, not even necessarily in the intro, where they are confused, afraid, and seeking safety from danger.

For Ludinus to think this "footage" is in his favor against the gods, and the complexity of the lore being what it is and the cast being the storytellers that they are, I think it must be the kind of series of events you can look at and see the humanity (using that word deliberately) for good and ill in all parties involved - and leave again with your biases if they're strong enough. Very curious what we will learn. I expect to weep. I can't wait.

[cyberneurotism]

teenage engineering EP–133 K.O. II

[studyingchemeng]

studying for unit operations I'm still in the intro stuf😭glad I only have 14 more classes to pass *and a dissertation* till I get my degree. I'm sitting exams for 10 of them God willing I pass 7 with good grades.

Day 3/30 days of productivity

[searchsystem]

Teenage Engineering (TE) / KOII / Sampler Composer / 2023

[foolishmortal]

tfw you fix a weird engineering bug

[tabooi]

shout out to the illegally produced starlight express production from india in 1987 for giving me prodigal he whistled at me choreography

[carsthatnevermadeitetc]

Citroën SM Preserial, 1970. Development of "Project S" had begun in 1961 as a grand tourer based on the DS and in 1968 Citroën had bought Maserati to gain access to their high performance engines. The result was the Robert Opron-designed SM first presented at the Geneva Motor Show with its Maserati 90º V6 engine driving the front wheels through a new 5-speed transmission (or 3 speed automatic).

[solpadeinedelusions]

yesterday i went to amazon development centre to meet other girls accepted to the engineering program. we divided ourselves into project groups by choosing which problem we wanted to work on and we talked about our ideas for a bit.

after a short break we had a group meeting with a psychologist where we discussed working in a group and got to know each other a bit more.

then we had lunch (every option had sesame and i'm allergic so i drank some coffee) and headed to a computer room where we got one alexa for a group and got to know how it works. we also got assigned to a python course, which is great because it's not really taught in school

[quartzdecay]

I have a request for people with experience with wheelchairs, if you personally use/used them or have people in your life that do: PLEASE COMPLAIN ABOUT THEM TO ME! TELL ME ABOUT THE WAYS IN WHICH THEY CAN SUCK! IN GENERAL OR SPECIFICS!

I need this information for a project I'm doing in my design class, wherein my group is going to attempt to prototype a wheelchair with both offroad and indoor capabilities, per say, that is still reasonably light and inexpensive. I'm asking this of you all on tumblr because to begin our project, we need to familiarize ourselves with the nature of this problem. We want our solution to actually be made with the opinions of wheelchair users in mind. I would be incredibly grateful if anyone could reblog or comment with any gripes they have about wheelchairs, especially in relation to their maneuverability, but anything works! Thank you so much for your time!

[studyingchemeng]

busy with lab reports and the upcoming winter exams, rainy days.... at least indigo is here to heal my soul and keep me company!

[searchsystem]

Teenage Engineering (TE) / The Absolut Company / Absolut Machines – Absolut Choir / Music Machine / 2008