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Enabling MSA Sign-In for China Users on MSN

MSN.cn sign-in feature

πŸ“Œ Overview

China-based users of MSN couldn’t previously sign in via their Microsoft acccount due to regulatory and infrastructure barriers, limiting personalisation and user retention. As Product Manager, I led a cross-functional effort to enable sign-in for China in full compliance with local laws, resulting in 4 million additional daily active users (DAUs) and 100 million new pageviews annually.

❓ The Problem

Microsoft lacked sign-in capabilities (MSA) in China for MSN, due to:

  • Strict regulatory requirements around data, identity, and authentication
  • Resulting in a degraded user experience for China users with no access to personalised content after browser cookies are cleared.

This gap restricted engagement and growth in a key strategic market.

πŸ’‘ The Solution

βœ… Regulatory & Infrastructure Compliance

  • Conducted a deep-dive audit of Chinese identity management laws with legal team.
  • Collaborated with legal, privacy, and compliance teams to ensure and validate a compliant sign-in path and solution.
  • Studied Bing’s implementation of MSA in China as a reference

πŸ” Identity & Access Integration (IAM)

  • Integrated Microsoft Account (MSA) sign-in via authentication API
  • Partnered with engineering to ensure secure, scalable rollout
  • Ran phased A/B testing: 5% β†’ 10% β†’ 45% β†’ 100% rollout strategy
  • Conducted real-user testing with China-based QA teams

πŸš€ Driving Adoption & Performance Monitoring

  • Implemented real-time monitoring tools post-launch to ensure system stability.

🀝 Cross-Functional Execution

  • Orchestrated collaboration between engineering, legal, privacy, and China market stakeholders
  • Managed bi-weekly project syncs and reported progress to executive teams,

πŸ“ˆ The Impact

  • βœ… 4M DAUs gained according to modelling tool
  • βœ… 100M additional annual pageviews according to modelling tool
  • βœ… Unlocks personalized experiences for China users (signed-in) (e.g. content recommendations)
  • βœ… Fully compliant with China’s data, privacy, and IAM regulations
  • βœ… Improved user satisfaction and retention in a previously underserved market

🧠 What I Did

  • Owned the end-to-end enablement strategy for sign-in in China
  • Led compliance and tech discovery, identifying implementation opportunities.
  • Managed cross-team delivery and phased experimentation
  • Ensured post-launch stability and stakeholder alignment

πŸ” Key Learnings

International expansion isn’t just about translating text β€” it’s about understanding infrastructure, regulation, and user expectations at a local level. This project showed how targeted, compliant product decisions can unlock enormous value in high-growth markets.