Growth/Growth 2014/Roadmap questions

As a part of 2013-14 mid-year product planning, each Wikimedia engineering team is writing its yearly roadmap a list of questions to be answered about our users. The following questions are organized on a per-project basis, and in rough order of priority.

Onboarding

 * See also: Onboarding new Wikipedians


 * 1) If users abandon the onboarding process, what is the best way to bring them back?
 * 2) Where do users expect to look for task suggestions on Wikipedia, and how do they expect them to work?
 * 3) How do we suggest next steps for users after they complete their first edit?
 * 4) How do we integrate users with the community after they complete onboarding?

Anonymous editor acquisition

 * See also: Anonymous editor acquisition


 * 1) What keeps anonymous editors from registering?
 * 2) What is the best way to interest anonymous editors in registering? What are the most compelling reasons to register, as anonymous editor?
 * 3) How aware are anonymous editors of the potential benefits to registering an account?
 * 4) How many anonymous actively choose to stay anonymous (versus being ignorant of the reasons for creating an account)?
 * 5) How many anonymous editors are first-time contributors, versus repeat anonymous contributors?
 * 6) What should the onboarding process look like for users who have edited anonymously prior to signing up?

Wikipedia article creation

 * See also: Wikipedia article creation

Note: article creation is a large and complex topic, so we've broken this product area down in to three sequential stages, each with their own questions. We're also focused on page creation by new editors, not experienced ones.


 * Discovery: pre-article creation
 * 1) How do new users expect to start, when they want to create an article?
 * 2) How can we effectively signal to users what content is lacking and needs to be created? If a user searches for a page that doesn't exist, what should the results tell them? How does this differ for users who are anonymous, new editors, or experienced registered editors?


 * Authorship: actually creating an article
 * 1) What kind of help do new users need when creating an article? How can we use automated heuristics to educate/warn users?
 * 2) Should we present new editors the option of creating a draft, and should this be in addition to creating immediately, or instead of it?
 * 3) What is the minimum viable article for Wikipedia, i.e. what will not be deleted on our largest projects?


 * Feedback: what happens after you begin creating an article, and especially after publication
 * 1) How can we encourage editors to keep improving their contribution?
 * 2) How can we help new editors find potential collaborators for their work?
 * 3) How can we reduce the negative impact of articles nominated for deletion?