does your website suck

Does Your Website Suck? Let Your Visitors Guide The Way

Michael Whitehouse – Senior Marketing Analyst

Who are we? (No boos, please!)

• Free website survey for SMBs, co-developed by Avinash Kaushik

• Four questions no site owner should be without

• Visitor-sourced data from December 2008

• 50,000 4Q survey respondents pulled from close to a thousand actively running studies

• Powerful VOC surveys, measuring all aspects of the user experience

• 5 million actual website visitors

• Over 700 projects for Fortune 2000 companies

• Helping to build a better web since 2000 www.iperceptions.com

4Q.iperceptions.com

The User Experience

There is no magic formula

But there are many winning formulas

Provided you know your audience

Knowing Your Audience

Using the right tools

A Great User Experience Pays Off

Visitors who report great user experiences are:

• Twice as likely to return to the site

• Four times as likely to report enhanced brand opinion

• Four times as likely to report higher future likelihood to purchase

Watching without listening

Watching without listening

Is this our visitor?

Watching without listening

Listen to Know

Who is here?Why are they here?

How am I doing?What do I need to fix?

Segmentation:What makes the web different from other media

Start with the basics

Then mix in visitor intent

Create Real Delineation

Learn Onsite to research and gather information for a future purchase

Support Onsite to get technical support for a specific product

Shop Onsite with the cognitive intent to make a purchase during the visit

Change Your Site’s Orientation

Tabbed navigation

Use metrics to measure outcomes

Conversion isn’t always about $

Average website in North America converts at 2-3%

This is what they should obsess

about.

This is what they obsess about.

Average website in North America converts at 2-3%

Behavioral Analytics

Voice of Customer Analytics

Conversion isn’t always about $

Average website in North America converts at 2-3%

Conversion

Task Completion

Conversion isn’t always about $

Verbatims = golden nuggets!

Your search results are misleading.

I can’t find links to the support page!

Update your product news ticker.

More than feedback alone

“NEEDBIGGER PICS”

More than feedback alone

Is this our visitor?Or is this our visitor?

More than feedback alone

Let’s try that again…

Your search results are misleading.

I can’t find links to the support page!

Update your product news ticker.

Male,Aged 20-29,2-3 monthly visits

Female, Aged 40-49, First visit

Male,Aged 30-39,Visits weekly

Be systematic about the user experience

Listen Measure Test Change

Rinse and Repeat

User experience measurement is evolving

BehavioralData

Voice ofCustomer

Data layering

Some advice on surveys

Every survey is an interruption

1) Be unobtrusive

2) Be polite

3) Sample what you need

The State of the User Experience

Setting the Table

Source: http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=2658

Non-Travel (Retail) Spending

*Corresponding days based on corresponding shopping days (Oct 27 – Dec 18, 2007)

Times are tough

http://www.coremetrics.com/downloads/coremetrics-benchmark-industry-report-2008-12-us.pdf

Best Buy Memo

”We can't change the overall level of consumer spending, but we can focus on deepening our relationships with customers wherever we interact with them: in our stores, on our Web sites and through our call centers….We must find ways to win with the customers who are coming to us today.”

Source: The Consumerist (http://consumerist.com/5084305best-buy-to-employees-survive-the-meltdown-by-making-customer-service-a-priority)

Your Site is Your Best Weapon

The Web businesses that will not only survive the downturn but come out ahead are those that will…

address customer confidence issuesthroughout their Web contact points.

Source: Forrester, Topic Overview: eBusiness and the Economy, November 14, 2008

TC by Industry

U.S. Retails Lagged Other Markets

Focus on US Retail - % Shares

Research / Learn (34%)

Buy (25%)

Price / Promo Shopping (15%)

Browse / Compare Products (8%)

FunnelActivities

Company Info (10%)

Profile management – 4%

Tech support – 3%Consume content – 1%

Post-Funnel Activities

FunnelActivities

Post-Funnel Activities

Consumer recession stretches funnel

Research

Browse

Buy

Old Reality: Compressed Funnel

Company Info

Research

New Reality: Lengthened Funnel

Browse

Promo Shop

Buy• Net out: More Brand Interactions!

US Retail – Task Completion

Research / Learn (74%)

Buy (56%)

Price / Promo Shopping (74%)

Browse / Compare Products (79%)

FunnelActivities

Company Info (85%)

Profile management – 72%

Tech support – 51%Consume content – 74%

Post-Funnel Activities

FunnelActivities

Post-Funnel Activities

What’s stopping buyers?

• Product availability and pricing might be beyond your control as a website marketer. But when you’re driving traffic to your website and these visitors can’t find what they’re looking for and they complain about site usability, these are big issues, and ones that you can fix!

Optimize for better Usability

Order cart

•“The shopping cart would not let me add anything to it. I tried to call your place of business and it was closed.”

•“I logged in several times and tired to purchase the Esther video or audio to download. When I tried to add to the cart, I received an error message. Really frustrating!”

•“Apparently I shop to slowly….the items in my cart kept disappearing if I wasn’t speedy!”

•“I wanted to purchase a pair of bike shoes, but there was no “Add to Cart” button/function.”

Didn’t find what I was looking for

• “Could not find the specific item I was looking for therefore I could not purchase.”

• “I didn’t find what I wanted. I was looking for something to give my 10 year old niece. I searched by age, gender, and interest. Nothing caught my eye.”

• “I was looking for a Prada perfume. I guess you just don’t carry it.”

• “I could not find the toy my daughter wanted. I had seen it in the catalogue we received at home.”

• “I was searching for a certain pair of boots that I purchased in a store. I wanted to buy a pair for my son but you don’t have them available online!”

• “You simply didn’t have anything for my son. I thought I could find the toys I had seen in your catalogue but I found nothing. I suppose I won’t be returning to the site again.”

The Advent of Social Shopping?

From Shop.org’s 9 E-Commerce Predictions for 2009:

2) Communal Conversion

“Retailers will investigate how to insert people and social connections into the buying process, illuminating and influencing the Black Hole Of Consideration.”

3) TWOM = Trusted Word of Mouth

“With new connective technologies, shoppers will now be able to see reviews, experiences, and critiques from people they actually know and trust.”

Source: http://blog.shop.org/2009/01/05/nine-e-commerce-predictions-for-2009/

The Advent of Social Shopping?

Wrapping up: Some takeaways

Times are tough and sites are feeling the pinch

Wrapping up: Some takeaways

Sites are struggling to convert would-be buyers

Wrapping up: Some takeaways

There is hope! Let your visitors guide the way

Wrapping up: Some takeaways

Two allies: segmentation and measurement

Wrapping up: Some takeaways

Be promiscuous and holistic

Thank you!