Phone-number-only accounts weren't a failed experiment. They were a deliberate inclusion bet, one that generated real early growth, then quietly became unsustainable.

Launched in late 2022, PNO accounts were designed to reach job seekers in India without email addresses, lowering the barrier to joining Indeed. The early signal was real: a 14% increase in account creation in India. The problem was what happened after sign-up. 

Over time, the data told a different story. PNO users showed significantly lower long-term engagement and hire rates than standard accounts. Their Indeed profiles weren't searchable, the core way Indeed creates value for job seekers, which meant the accounts existed but couldn't fully participate in the platform. Account recovery had become non-functional following regulatory changes to phone recycling solutions. And the accounts required passwords, creating friction at odds with how Indeed was evolving its sign-in experience.

These were users who hadn't logged in for two or more years. The design couldn't assume attention, it had to earn it.

A disengaged user reading a deprecation notice is in a different headspace than an active user responding to a product update. They're likely confused about why they're hearing from a platform they barely remember using. Dense, alarming, or unclear messages get ignored.

NOTIFICATION SEQUENCE

Each touchpoint was calibrated to where users were in the timeline, what action was still available, and what urgency was appropriate.

The deprecation established a repeatable pattern for how Indeed handles legacy account migrations at scale with legal alignment, sequenced communication, and UX designed for disengagement.