How we increased financing checkouts from 47% to 89% by changing where we introduced financing

Product: EnergyStack by Rivy · Role: Lead Product Designer · Focus: User Research, Conversion Optimisation, E-commerce UX

EnergyStack was an e-commerce platform we built at Rivy to help customers purchase solar products outright or through financing.

After launching, we started noticing something interesting. People were visiting the platform, browsing products, and exploring their options, but many weren't progressing to checkout.

We had a product discovery problem, and we needed to understand why.

So we conducted a UX and user research audit to identify where customers were dropping off and what might be preventing them from purchasing.

One insight stood out: Solar products were expensive, and affordability was a major barrier to purchase.

The interesting part? We already had a solution for that.

Rivy offered financing that allowed customers to pay as little as 10% upfront and spread the remaining cost over several months.

But we'd made a critical design decision when building EnergyStack.

We introduced financing primarily at checkout.

Customers would browse products, add them to their cart, and only then discover that they could choose between paying outright or financing their purchase.

On paper, it made sense. Financing was a payment method, so we placed it where customers chose how to pay.

But we had overlooked something: customers who couldn't afford the full price weren't necessarily making it to checkout.

Someone browsing a solar inverter costing ₦2.3 million might leave immediately after seeing the price, without knowing they could start with approximately ₦230,000.

We were waiting until customers had decided to purchase before telling them something that could influence that decision.

Our research changed how we thought about financing.

We had initially treated it as a payment option. But for customers purchasing expensive solar equipment, financing could be a key reason to consider buying.

That meant affordability needed to be communicated much earlier in the shopping journey.

We redesigned three key touchpoints.

Homepage: Make financing part of the first impression

Previously, the homepage focused on showcasing solar products.

We introduced financing-led promotional banners that communicated how customers could purchase products by paying just a fraction of the total cost upfront.

Instead of simply advertising a solar solution at its full price, we could communicate that customers could get started with as little as 10% upfront.

This meant customers understood that financing was available before they even started exploring products.

Product details: Make affordability tangible

This was one of the most important changes.

Previously, customers saw the full product price and had to proceed to checkout before exploring financing.

We redesigned the product details page to display a financing breakdown specific to each product.

For example, instead of presenting only a solar installation priced at ₦2.3 million, customers could also see:

• Full price: ₦2,300,000
• Pay from: ₦230,000 upfront
• Spread the balance: Over the available financing period

These weren't generic financing promotions. The figures were contextual to the product customers were viewing.

Our goal was to help customers evaluate affordability while they were still deciding whether a product was within reach.

Checkout: Keep both payment options

We didn't remove the original checkout experience.

Customers could still choose to pay outright or apply for financing.

The difference was that financing was no longer a surprise discovered at the end of the journey.

By the time customers reached checkout, they had already been introduced to the possibility of spreading payments.

Before the redesign, the checkout split was relatively balanced.

47% of checkouts selected financing, while 53% selected cash payments.

After introducing financing throughout the shopping journey, that changed significantly.

Financing grew to 89% of checkouts, a 42-percentage-point increase.

This was an important outcome for EnergyStack because the platform was designed not only to sell solar products but also to create more opportunities for customers to access Rivy's financing.

The redesign helped make financing a more visible part of the purchase journey and was followed by a significant shift towards financing at checkout.

Note: This metric measures the proportion of checkouts choosing financing, not the overall visitor-to-purchase conversion rate.

This project changed how I think about communicating value in product experiences.

When we first designed EnergyStack, we positioned financing as a payment method because that was where it logically belonged in the transaction flow.

But our research helped us see it differently.

For someone who could afford a product outright, financing might simply be another payment option.

For someone who couldn't, financing could be the difference between considering a purchase and abandoning the idea entirely.

The value of financing wasn't limited to checkout. It was relevant from the moment customers started evaluating products.

The biggest lesson for me was simple: Don't wait until users reach the end of a journey to communicate something that could motivate them to begin it.