building trust through restricted information: a case study of the hotwire.com air redesign

Building trust through restricted information:A case study of the Hotwire.com air redesign

IA Summit 2008

Melissa Matross

Senior Manager, User Experience

mmatross@hotwire.com

Trust

brands I trust

Excellent serviceStands behind products with a “no questions asked” return policy

brands I trust

Excellent serviceStands behind products with a “no questions asked” return policy

Quality for good priceFocus on trend & design

brands I trust

Excellent serviceStands behind products with a “no questions asked” return policy

Excellent serviceMakes life easier when bad things happen

Quality for good priceFocus on trend & design

brands I trust

Excellent serviceStands behind products with a “no questions asked” return policy

Excellent serviceMakes life easier when bad things happen

Quality for good priceFocus on trend & design

Excellent end-to-end experience for userQuality productsFocus on key products

brands I trust

Service

Focused experience

Quality

brands I trust

Owned by Expedia, Hotwire.com is a discount travel site

Business model: Opaque booking model

Car

Hotel

AirDecreasing opaque

Single opaque & multiple retail

Flight timesDuration

Number of stopsCarrier

Product Conceal

Approx. 30%

SavingsModel

100% opaque

No retail

Exact locationBrand

Room typeApprox. 60%

Opaque

Retail back upRental agency

Approx. 20%(sometimes

50-60%)

We’ve tried to mitigate against distrust through:

Education

Testimonials

Direct comparisons

Orbitz

American Airlines

Kayak

Sidestep

When presented with the choice between opaque and retail more than 2/3 of the users chose opaque

Conclusion: Users are more flexible than they think & price is the primary motivator for our users

Multi-airport Search

Search Results• All options within list; some filtering• Lowest price options displayed; no account for preferred airports

Impact• About 25% of customers searched for alternate airports (either 1 or both)• Those customers did approx 75% of all Hotwire air searches• As search options increased, purchase rate decreased

Conclusion: Dedicated customers were overwhelmed by the different options and were not getting what they wanted

Flexible Date Search

Search • Link from main search box• Inquires if user is flexible

Search Results• Lowest price options presented

Impact• About 10-15% of customers searched flexible dates• Flexible date customers purchased twice as frequently as primary search

Conclusion: Users that indicated flexibility upfront were able to find lower priced alternatives and were more likely to buy with Hotwire

To recap:

Opaque = distrust1

To recap:

Opaque = distrust

Shopping for travel = distrust & work

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To recap:

Opaque = distrust

Shopping for travel = distrust & work

Competitor offering of data/options = more work & responsibility for the user

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To recap:

Opaque = distrust

Shopping for travel = distrust & work

Competitor offering of data/options = more work & responsibility for the user

Most users are more flexible than they think

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To recap:

Opaque = distrust

Shopping for travel = distrust & work

Competitor offering of data/options = more work & responsibility for the user

Most users are more flexible than they think

Flexible users are more engaged and more likely to purchase when prices are lower

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Goals for air redesign:

• Improve access to opaque inventory

Goals for air redesign:

• Improve access to opaque inventory

• Provide users with expected fare results while exposing them to lower fare alternatives

Goals for air redesign:

• Improve access to opaque inventory

• Provide users with expected fare results while exposing them to lower fare alternatives

• Articulate trade-offs between fare types

Goals for air redesign:

• Improve access to opaque inventory

• Provide users with expected fare results while exposing them to lower fare alternatives

• Articulate trade-offs between fare types

• Improve general user experience

Users are open to a series of trade-offs

Small

Medium

Large

Connections

Schedule

Carrier

Non-stop or 1-3 stops

Morning/afternoon departure

Delta or Jetblue

Alternate Airports MIA or FLL

Alternate Dates + or – 1 day

Changeability Change penalty

Flexible Dates Anytime in April

Flexible Destinations Maui or Cabo

Products Flight or Packages

Tradeoff Example

Trade-offs

Barry on trade-offs:• We don’t like giving up things to get what we want• Each additional option presents something we have to

give up if we don’t choose it

With increased choice, we want it all. We imagine alternatives that don’t exist, and we are less satisfied with reality.

Trust

Travel Agent

Live Demo

Seducible moments

Limited Choice

Tradeoffs

Tradeoffs

Anchoring & Framing

Anchoring & Framing

User Research results:

• Positive reactions to the layer: • “easy to understand”• Recognition that a little flexibility could save money

• Most people selected an alternate because they liked being presented with lower priced fares

• Results page described as “intuitive, colorful, clean and easy to navigate”

10-20% increase in alternate searches

10-20% increase in alternate searches

50-55% higher opaque purchase rate for engaged customers

10-20% increase in alternate searches

50-55% higher opaque purchase rate for engaged customers

10-20% increase in conversion

From Smarter Travel:

Hotwire makes flexible searching easier

Last week, Hotwire unveiled improvements that make it easier for users to find the cheapest flights. Now, every time you search, the site will automatically check alternate airports and travel dates one or two days before or after your designated dates. It also lets you search for the cheapest days to fly within a 30-day window. Notably, all these functions work for international as well as domestic flights.

Other sites offer similar search tools, but most require you to take extra steps or perform multiple searches to figure out if an alternate airport or different travel dates would be cheaper than your initial travel plans. Kayak, for example, can look at both alternate airports and travel dates with one search.However, you have to use a variety of check boxes and pull-down menus to tell it what you want, and then the results are shown all jumbled together, rather than neatly separated like they are on Hotwire. Orbitz offers the same 30-day flexible date search tool as Hotwire, but Hotwire displays its results in a more easily scannable (to my eyes, anyway) format.

Overall, I'd say these improvements vault Hotwire to the front of the flexible search class.

Trust

What’s next?

What can you do?

Understand what your users actually want and what they say they want

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What can you do?

Understand what your users actually want and what they say they want

Understand how they make decisions and present trade-offs appropriately

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What can you do?

Understand what your users actually want and what they say they want

Understand how they make decisions and present trade-offs appropriately

Identify what makes your offering unique

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What can you do?

Understand what your users actually want and what they say they want

Understand how they make decisions and present trade-offs appropriately

Identify what makes your offering unique

Take risks

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What can you do?

Understand what your users actually want and what they say they want

Understand how they make decisions and present trade-offs appropriately

Identify what makes your offering unique

Take risks

Have fun!!

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Thank you.

Questions?

Melissa Matross

Senior Manager, User Experience

mmatross@hotwire.com

Mike Brown

Senior Product Manager, Air & Car

mbrown@hotwire.com

Ann Ku

Senior Interaction Designer

aku@hotwire.com

We’re hiring!!!