Note: Client has requested no proper names to be used, including the name of their company, but has agreed to allow all other information about the project to be publicized.
User Researcher
Led a series of customer interviews to investigate satisfaction in placing orders. Then, conducted interviews of company stakeholders to gather information on individual business goals.
User Experience Designer
Proposed and implemented web site changes based on feedback gathered in customer and employee interviews.
Project Manager
Guided client through multi-phase research project, creating timelines and maintaining transparent communication throughout.
THE CLIENT
The client is a large scale B2B wholesale distributer, with revenues in the hundreds of millions. They currently receive orders online and over the phone.
The Challenge
Business Goals
In preliminary meetings, the client stated they wish to increase their online sales from 20% of overall orders to 50%. However, they were unsure of how to close that gap. This desire stems from a few places. First, their knowledge of the changing marketplace, where trends show that as time goes on, more and more people will prefer placing orders online. Second, considering their desire to continue scaling, they want to provide a more cost-effective way of fulfilling orders. With their call centers requiring extensive training time for new employees, focusing on improving the website seems an obvious choice for them.
Recommendation
To better determine why only 20% of orders were placed online, I recommended conducting qualitative customer interviews to determine current attitudes about placing orders both online and over the phone with this company.
User Research
Analysis
My client gave me a list of their current customers and a breakdown of their annual spend of phone vs. online orders. I cold-called these customers until I was able to complete 18 interviews.
Overall, I found that my client’s customers are quite happy with the service and selection they offer. For the most part, people were very complimentary on one or several components of their customer experience.
Most of the compliments I heard centered around the level of service they get from their salesperson (or salespeople). It was obvious that the level of service these people provide is the backbone of their business. Many of the people I interviewed referred to these people by their first name, and talked about them as if they were a key ally in the success of their business.
While it was great to hear that everyone feels as if they have an ally within my client’s business, calling their local salesperson does become an “easy button” for many people who don’t realize that the website could provide the same amount of service for certain types of orders.
Generally speaking, customers saw my client’s website as neither great nor terrible. On a scale from 1 to 10, my estimation of people’s satisfaction with the website would fall somewhere in the 4 to 5 range. There were a handful of “power users” I talked to, who use the website all the time, and are comfortable navigating and placing orders. But for the majority of customers, their perception of the website is mediocre. However, there’s good news–this perception is not tied to trust of the the client’s name, which is the hardest psychological mindset to change. It’s tied to the user experience (UX) of the website, which is a much easier hill to climb.
User Profile
While every customer I spoke with had unique characteristics, there was a clear pattern of traits worth mentioning. Most obviously to me, their customers are busy. A few agreed to talk to me only if they could keep working while we were on the phone. A few had to put me on hold to speak to a customer who walked in. Several mentioned that they operate very last minute on a regular basis. Overall, it seems to me that perceived convenience and speed drives almost all of the decisions they make. It’s for this reason that they will often call to place an order, because it seems faster than going online.
While their first priority is time, their second most important goal is finding the best price for what they need. This is a bit of a no-brainer, that the cheaper they can get a raw material from the client, the cheaper they can offer their services to their customers, or the higher their profit. I recommended these two contexts of convenience and price be at the core of decisions about my client’s UX.
Everyone I spoke with had placed at least one order online, even if it wasn’t their primary method. They all shop the website on a desktop, and could see no reason why an improved mobile site experience would greatly impact their day-to-day. Based on these interviews, I see 2 reasons that people shop on the desktop primarily (or solely).
First, since shopping the client’s site is part of their day job, they’re often at some sort of stationary desk. Also worth considering are the assumptions many of your customers are likely making about your mobile shopping experience. Generally, if your desktop experience is less than stellar, people will assume your mobile shopping experience is not even worth investigating. Typically once you improve your desktop experience, you will start to see an uptick in your mobile traffic. This is why it’s imperative to improve your mobile experience as well, even if you put more focus on improving the desktop one.
Most of my interviewees were men. Stereotypically, men like “easy buttons” when they shop. The faster you can get them in and out, the more likely they will be to return. This also directly ties back to the need for convenience in shopping.
Still, one third of my interviewees were women, which was particularly important to analyze. My client sells to businesses that are almost always owned by men. Because of this, they assumed their target user was always male. From my research, although the business might be owned by a man, a woman places the orders a significant portion of time.
I asked the question, “How often do you shop online in your life in general?” Everyone I talked to is shopping online at least sometimes. Even your customers who only place 3% of their orders with my client online say they shop online regularly.
I also asked the question, “What are some websites you like to shop?” Amazon was a frequent answer. It’s likely that your customers are comparing their user experience shopping my client’s website with theirs on Amazon. This is typical for all websites, and not surprising in the least bit.
Project Details
Date: January 5, 2017