The Brief
Gift&Go needed me to review their customer loyalty marketplace for PENN Entertainment (a real, live store). The ask was straightforward: as a Product Owner, how would I improve it, and where would I start? The challenge was to prioritise, to focus on the highest-impact opportunities without getting lost in a long tail of secondary issues.
I was given public access only (no login credentials to test the redemption flow) and asked to deliver user stories that I would take to a development team. The constraint was deliberate: no endless rabbit holes, just focused product thinking.
Discovery & Framing
My review of the marketplace identified a strategic misalignment between what the platform was attempting to do and what it was actually delivering to users. The PENN Entertainment ecosystem depends on creating tight loops between activity (playing) and outcome (earning and redeeming rewards). The marketplace sits at the critical “burn” point of that loop, it’s where the psychological investment converts into tangible action.
Three clear gaps emerged:
The Trust Gap (Sign-up focus)
The public-facing UI felt dated and unpolished. New users arriving at the marketplace had no confidence that this was a secure, professional program worth joining. UI hygiene directly influenced perception of legitimacy.
The Value Gap (Earn focus)
Users couldn’t see what rewards actually cost in PENN Cash without logging in. This creates a broken discovery loop. A casual visitor has no reason to play harder if they can’t see what they’re working towards. Transparency in product costs is the primary motivator for sustained play.
The Friction Gap (Burn focus)
The redemption flow had multiple “dead ends” and navigation hurdles. Users could get stuck in category trees, lose their carts, or abandon purchases because the path to completion wasn’t frictionless. This directly leaks retention.
Strategic Goals
Every proposed feature had to drive at least one of three core outcomes:
Sign-up (acquisition)
Attracting non-members or casual visitors to join the PENN Play program. Professionalising the public-facing UI to act as a recruitment tool.
Earn (motivation)
Creating a psychological bridge between gaming activities and tangible rewards. Ensuring transparency in product costs to motivate sustained play.
Burn (retention)
Encouraging users to redeem points, clearing financial liability and completing the loyalty loop. Removing “dead ends” and UX hurdles to ensure successful redemption.
Prioritised User Stories
I delivered a structured backlog that reflected the current lifecycle of the highest-priority initiatives. Items marked Backlog were groomed and ready for the next Sprint.
| User Story | Impact | Effort | Priority | Goal | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Expose PENN Cash values: “As a user, I want to see product costs without logging in so I have a goal to play for.” | Critical | Low | P0 | Earn | Backlog |
| Onward / back nav: “As a user, I want to navigate back to categories easily so I don’t get stuck.” | Medium | Low | P0 | Burn | Backlog |
| Anonymous add to cart: “As a visitor, I want to build a cart before logging in to increase my intent to redeem.” | High | Medium | P1 | Burn | UX |
| Readable descriptions: “As a buyer, I want clear, legible product details so I can confidently choose a reward.” | Medium | Low | P1 | Burn | Backlog |
| UI hygiene: “As a prospect, I want a professional UI so I feel the program is secure.” | Medium | Medium | P2 | Sign-up | UI |
| Cross-sell recommendations: “As a player, I want to see related items to maximise my redemption value.” | Medium | High | P2 | Burn | R&D |
| Dynamic hero promotions: “As a new user, I want to see great rewards on the home page so I am enticed to join.” | Low | Medium | P2 | Sign-up | UI |
| Point/price filtering: “As a player, I want to filter items I can afford so I can set an immediate goal.” | Medium | High | P3 | Earn | R&D |
Beyond these headline items, the full backlog contained 42 additional initiatives, including accessibility (WCAG 2.1) fixes, session persistence optimisations, localised content mapping, and secondary UI bug fixes.
Sprint 1 Roadmap
For the immediate upcoming sprint, I pulled the following Backlog items into development. These had completed Design and Grooming phases:
1. Expose PENN Cash Values (P0)
- Status: Ready for Dev
- Handover: High-fidelity mockup and API endpoint documentation attached to the ticket
2. Breadcrumb & Navigation (P0)
- Status: Ready for Dev
- Handover: User flow diagram mapping the “Back” logic across all product categories finalised
Definition of Done
To ensure high-velocity development, I provided clear status definitions for all ticket states:
- R&D: High-level feasibility check and business logic definition
- Design (UX/UI): Wireframing, user flow mapping, and high-fidelity asset creation
- Backlog: The “Three Amigos” (PO, Dev, Design) have signed off; ticket includes Acceptance Criteria and all technical prerequisites
- Development: Active work in progress
- QA: Verification in progress
This framework ensured that every ticket entering development had the same level of rigour and clarity, regardless of complexity.