User reviews of the big boys: Part 2 (From a grumpy old web user)

1st October 2009

User reviews of the big boys: Part 2 (From a grumpy old web user)

So before I start the review of the remaining 3 sites I said I’d take a look at, let’s be clear, if I was that smart, I wouldn’t be writing this, I’d have made my fortune and would be off sunning myself on my yacht, or on the balcony of my villa on Cap D’Antibes. And I’d be starting the process of getting in shape for my first skiing holiday of the winter. So given that I’m sitting in Costa Coffee next to Farringdon tube, prior to looking at Tesco.com, Expedia.co.uk and Play.com, I’ve got someway to go yet!

So whilst I clearly don’t have all the answers, what I do know is what type of experience web users look for when buying or booking anything online. That’s my game. This is what I do for a living, and I help lots of other businesses do it better.

So here’s my view of some of the important aspects of ‘findability’ and ‘the checkout process’ on the three remaining site reviews of three of the biggest sites in the UK; I visited Tesco.com, a brand and a company I have much admiration for  (I’m softening the blow), Expedia.co.uk and Play.com.

Tesco.com

First thing I noticed when I landed on Tesco.com was that they were offering double club card points when you register on Tesco Direct or on groceries. Now that seems like a fairly compelling offer.

When you land on Tesco.com, you also see a lot of choices in terms of where you can go next. So, given that like most web users I’m task rich and time poor, I looked for a search box. Why? Because like 40 odd percent of the population, I want to find products REALLY quickly, and that means finding products through the search box.

Unfortunately there is no search facility on the home page of Tesco.com. And whilst I fully appreciate that Tesco has some technical challenges relating to the existing e-commerce architecture, a search facility at this level is achievable and would be really helpful to the user, even more so as they bring all of the product categories together in order to continually extend their range and look to increase both the average basket value and lifetime value of customers.

So without the aid of a search facility I selected groceries, and the first thing I encountered was a forced log in or mandatory registration BEFORE I could even get to the groceries. Well goodbye then!  

I have to say I’m really surprised by this. I am by no means the world’s expert of grocery retailing, however, I can’t imagine that it would be that different from all other retail categories online where forcing registration leads to a significant abandonment rate, around 23% I believe my friends at Forrester suggest. And that rate applies to sites that force registration AFTER you’ve been to the basket and started the checkout process.

Now if this was instore, this would be the same as Tesco staff stopping me at the door, demanding my name and address and contact details BEFORE they even let me in. Clearly that would have a significant impact upon sales.

I once doubled the conversion rate of a well - known high street sports retailer by suggesting they move registration from the stage BEFORE the basket to the stage after the basket and that they didn’t enforce registration.

I can completely see the benefits to Tesco in terms of capturing customer data, and I’d also imagine it’s partly to do with being able to offer a more personalized experience to a customer once they’ve logged in. But unless this forced registration for new customers is linked to some value add for the customer (Like the double Clubcard points) having to endure this additional process, it will lead to significant levels of drop off. For some reason, this is not promoted when you go straight to the groceries link on the top navigation.

Having given up on buying my groceries, I went on to the wine shop. My search for ‘French’ (yes there is a search box) brought back an interesting array of some French wines interspersed with Californian wine and chardonnay from the US. So, a bit of work needed here to fine tune search. Whereas had I searched for ‘France’ I’d have found 252 bottles as opposed to 26 under my previous search. However, looking under the sub category ‘French’ shows there’s only 94 options. So, to be honest I don’t know how many relevant options I’d have to choose from. Is it 252 or 94?

On the positive side, the navigation options are pretty good, however search doesn’t handle synonyms, otherwise my search for ‘French’ would have brought back the 256 options above under ‘France’.

This said faceted search works well and when I finally did find the full selection of French wines, I was able to narrow my selection down pretty quickly to the right Country, grape and price (The latter clearly being in the £20+ category!)

So I added a case of something I can neither pronounce, nor spell, to my basket and what’s this? I’m unable to checkout until I’ve read the minimum criteria for purchasing! But I’m buying a case, surely that meets the criteria? I think I’d leave at this point to be honest… 

And even more annoyingly, after adding my case of wine to the basket, the checkout button is greyed out and I can’t checkout! Oh! I’ve got it. I need to view my full basket before checking out…No, that’s not the issue, now I’ve got it. Silly me, I need to order a minimum of 12 bottles. And I only had 6, well that’ll teach me for trying to be Billy big boots and buy an expensive wine that I clearly can’t afford 12 bottles of!

I know where I went wrong. Having already seen copy and content telling me that I needed to order a minimum of 12 bottles earlier in the purchase path, I had made the assumption that when I added a wine I liked to my basket it would automatically have selected one case, which I assumed would include 12 bottles.

I wonder if they’ve done any analysis to compare drop off at this stage of the purchase path vs. any increase in average basket values created by offering 6 bottles of wine when the minimum purchase is 12?

Ok, so I added another 12 bottles, but look, even after 18 bottles the checkout button is still greyed out. This really would test the patience of any customer, even those who due to their love of the grape have a little more time on their hands than most.

‘Her indoors’ had a similar experience when the button was greyed out one time for almost a week’s worth of attempts to redeem Tesco vouchers for air miles!

Sorry guys, as much as I really like Tesco, I’m heading to Majestic Wine to see if I can get my plonk of choice there…more of that another time.

Expedia.co.uk

And so onto the next site. This time Expedia.co.uk.

And guess, what? It’s another site with no search box on the homepage. Why not? Surely it would be beneficial to help customers find what they’re looking for quickly and painlessly? (LastMinute.com has one)

I’ve got to be honest and say that from a design perspective, I don’t feel particularly inspired when I land on expedia.co.uk to the contrary it makes me feel like curling up in my duvet with a hot water bottle. Excite me, engage me, interact with me, tantalize me; you’re in the ‘pick me up business’ after all. And with the on-set of autumn, shortly followed by winter, I’ve already picked up a cold from my two snotty nosed children (Swine flu to follow no doubt), cheer me up. Entice me to book an amazing holiday to some exotic destination next year.

OK, let’s give them another chance.  I want to book a family holiday in the US for next summer. Probably fly drive. Not sure.

‘Create your trip’ on the homepage looks like the ideal place to find what I’m looking for.

Now I need to confess at this point that one major irritation I always have trying to book a holiday online is that you can’t select adjoining rooms, nor can you normally even tell whether or not that’s available and with two young kids it’s a necessity for us (yes I know you can get 4 in one room, but no thanks!)

So having entered my fly drive/hotel options and selected dates and selected LA to fly to, this is what I got on the next page.

Now why can’t you have told me what the airport options were on the previous page in an intuitive and interactive way the way thetrainline.com would help you select the right station? And in any case, you and I both know that no major airlines fly from the UK to the other two airports listed. So why show me them in the first place?

Right guys, you’re on your third and final strike now. One more irritation and I’m off to Last minute.com.

To compound matters, the call to action for what I do next is pretty ambiguous and not prominent enough. After a minute I realized I had to ‘search for holidays.’  I thought I had already done that?

The next stage really didn’t deliver a great user experience. I had a number of ‘faceted search’ options to narrow down the number of relevant options. But given that I’m buying for my family, I would have thought that one of these choices would have been ‘swimming pool.’ And although most hotels have these, not all of them do. I don’t want a boutique hotel in the middle of LA; I want a family orientated hotel with all relevant facilities.

I wonder if it might prove more effective to enable users to narrow their selection based on customer segmentation and need i.e. Family, business, couples etc?

So when I was presented with additional options to narrow my selection down by filters such as price, name of hotel etc, I couldn’t even see all of the options (See the screen grab below) due to their own version of ‘sponsored links’ on the right hand side, so that’s it. The third strike. I’m out of here.

I’m off to the competition for a better user experience (Hopefully).

Play.com

This time I really need to chill out, I need something that’s going to help me relax after these two less than ideal experiences.

So my mouse and I head off to Play.com for a CD, DVD, computer game etc.

Whey hey! A search box. And it smacks you in the face the minute you land on the site. You can’t miss it. And it also enables you to search by category and sub category for specific products.

But it doesn’t bring back customer service related searches, so that’s a small downside.

When you search through the search box there’s no faceted search facility so you can’t narrow down the options by price, gender etc. I may well be a gift buyer looking for toys for boys, within a certain range of prices, so let me narrow down the choices please.

In fact even when you go into the categories and sub categories you can only narrow your selection by limited criteria such as bestsellers.

I went into CD’s and went to purchase a remixed version of U2’s Joshua Tree album (I’m still rockin’), and you see a really strong call to action showing that the CD has been added to my basket, giving me the option to checkout or continue shopping. As the Meerkat would say, ‘simples.’ That’s how you do it. No ambiguity, none of this “what I do next business?”.

However, my joy was short-lived, unfortunately as soon as I clicked on shopping bag I’m being forced to log in or register. Sorry guys, you really need to give me the option of buying without registering. At the very least, you need to let me see my shopping bag BEFORE I need to start the registration process.

This will definitely lead to site abandonment, because at this stage you don’t even know what the delivery options are. And although there is free delivery, it won’t be obvious to everyone.

So to sum up, Play.com does most things really well. But I bet there’s a good 25% increase in conversion available by moving the registration process to after the basket and by not forcing registration (A few back catalogues would be nice thanks)

Asides from that, it’s a well-designed site catering for the needs of most key user groups in a fairly intuitive and engaging way. But I am a little surprised at some of the fundamental e-commerce faux pas around search and the checkout.

So that’s it. Some free advice that should enable some of the UK’s leading retailers to get some additional upside this peak trading period. As the saying goes, ‘every little helps.’

Want to know more? Come and meet me at e-commerce expo for some free tips of your own on how to improve the performance of your e-commerce channel.

Oh yes, before I forget, read all about it: www.martinnewman.co.uk or talk to me at: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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