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Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

blog.mailchimp.com

11–20 of 76 posts

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#11
It's old but the point about losing your login, say if Facebook deleted your acount, should not be an issue. If you sign up using Facebook, Facebook gives the requestor your email address. All they have to to is reset their password by email and login using the username and passsword.

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#12
post #6

This is bad advice for anyone that's not a SaaS company selling to people on non-mobile browsers, like MailChimp is. Our analytics show that many people on mobile and consumer websites do indeed want to use OAuth. (I've been meaning to do a blog post on this topic...)

Can you elaborate a little?

Using OAuth is fine and all... but it's not eliminating the customer from having to sign-in still... ie. they are still typing a username and password, just not into your system.

So what are the benefits (both perceived and actual)?

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#14

Facebook and twitter may simply be the wrong form of login for a business tool. That's partly why I'm biased towards Google, since they have fairly neutral associations. People don't usually post anything embaressing to google, and so wouldnt be as threatened with a company wanting access to their Google account. On the other hand, more options are more distractions. Email and password is so simple and well understoo…

Also Google has a B2B product suite, so some people might have already a Google account from their company which they can use.

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#15
post #5

I think the real takeaway is "Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It _For B2B_" Very few people are going to sign up or log into a business account using a personal facebook or twitter account, and few businesses are going to have a lot of people with direct access to their facebook page and twitter feeds.

Imagine if linked in or something similarly businessish got into that space.

I have a hotmail account I use for all my professional MS related needs that has become my business social sign-on account. In general, there's room for innovation here. Google really screwed the pooch when they decided Plus Circles were an internal organizational tool instead of a public facade.

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#16
post #12
post #6

This is bad advice for anyone that's not a SaaS company selling to people on non-mobile browsers, like MailChimp is. Our analytics show that many people on mobile and consumer websites do indeed want to use OAuth. (I've been meaning to do a blog post on this topic...)

Can you elaborate a little? Using OAuth is fine and all... but it's not eliminating the customer from having to sign-in still... ie. they are still typing a username and password, just not into your system. So what are the benefits (both perceived and actual)?

We have seen a number of customers who improved their overall signup rates by adding OAuth as an option. The effect is even more pronounced on mobile and consumer web.

Most people do not log out of Facebook and Google on their devices, so they do not have to sign-in. They just click "Facebook" then "Approve." That's much easier than filling out your email and password -- particularly on a mobile device.

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#17
post #12
post #6

This is bad advice for anyone that's not a SaaS company selling to people on non-mobile browsers, like MailChimp is. Our analytics show that many people on mobile and consumer websites do indeed want to use OAuth. (I've been meaning to do a blog post on this topic...)

Can you elaborate a little? Using OAuth is fine and all... but it's not eliminating the customer from having to sign-in still... ie. they are still typing a username and password, just not into your system. So what are the benefits (both perceived and actual)?

If they're already logged into Facebook/Twitter, they don't have to type a single thing -- they just hit the "Accept" button and they're done.

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#18

> Our old login form told users, "Your username or password is incorrect," when they may have the username right, but the password was incorrect. If you have 4 possible usernames and 4 possible passwords, you have 16 possible combinations between them—only one of which is correct. That means in this scenario, the user would have 15 chances to make an error when logging in. But when you know specifically that your use…

When you create an account and the username already exists, the website tells you that. How is this difficult for someone to do this instead of guessing the username on the login page? It's the same.

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#19

> Our old login form told users, "Your username or password is incorrect," when they may have the username right, but the password was incorrect. If you have 4 possible usernames and 4 possible passwords, you have 16 possible combinations between them—only one of which is correct. That means in this scenario, the user would have 15 chances to make an error when logging in. But when you know specifically that your use…

the reason for it is specifically addressed in the article...

"But after some further consideration, we decided that it was a false risk, as the username reminder form already tells you if a username exists"

Re: Social Login Buttons Aren't Worth It (2012)

#20
Here how I read this; "Since social login buttons aren't worth it, it's best to setup a login based on email and manage an email communication with your users instead of social ones. And by the way, Mailchimp may help you with your communication with your customers. Now remove those social buttons and come back to email".

Funnily, I agree with the conclusion and I'm using mailchimp extensively.

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