Atlantic Business Technologies, Inc.

Category: User Experience

  • WFH Workshops: How we effectively conduct UX workshops at home.

    WFH Workshops: How we effectively conduct UX workshops at home.

    What is a UX workshop?

    At Atlantic BT, we use workshops to define strategic direction of development projects. A UX workshop typically includes assembling stakeholders in a room to work on refining some aspect of the user experience with a web application. While meeting the team, we collaborate to gather requirements, perform exercises to gain clarity, and generate ideas. 

    While this method has always been a staple in our Discovery process, we’ve had to quickly adapt to changing times. Now, we are continuing to improve the process of remote workshopping.

    Through new tools and remote techniques, we’ve been able to keep our client relationships meaningful, collaborative, and productive.

    Pre-covid, what was the normal workshop process?

    Our workshops are designed to identify needed features and define interface elements, which are later translated to development criteria. 

    While each in-person workshop was uniquely tailored to address a particular need, several process elements would stay consistent. 

    First of all, we liked to have 3-5 people present in a distraction-free space. We find that less than three people removes the collaborative group element and waters down the generation of ideas. On the other hand, more than 5 people can be noisier and create chaos.

    Secondly, we liked to perform exercises with markers, post-its, and a whiteboard. These simple tools make it easy for everyone to participate in generating ideas and create clear patterns.

    Some examples of activities that could take place include:

    • A group writes ideas on Post-it notes and places them on the board. Here, they can see where they agree, disagree, and any trends in their thoughts. When people notice these groupings and similarities, it fosters deeper thinking and new ideas.
    • After completion of an affinity mapping exercise and pulling out key points, you can have group voting with color coding (put all your dots on one idea or spread across several, etc.).

    Remote workshopping creates some key challenges for participants.

    ABTers are recognizing some advantages of in-person workshops and downfalls of virtual meetings. Take a look at some of the challenges we’ve identified and our creative approach to tackling them.

    Encouraging participation.

    In-person workshops were conducted in an environment where positive peer pressure boosted participation. People are simply more likely to speak up when they are surrounded by other people who participate.

    In order to keep people engaged and prevent them from working on side activities while at home, we keep some sort of visual on the screen at all times. This could be a live prototype or virtual whiteboard as we organize our thoughts on the screen.

    Finding ways to read the audience.

    It was easier to read the energy of the room while presenting. A presenter could easily ask participants why they looked puzzled or instate a quick coffee break.

    Virtually, it’s harder to look at each person while presenting. We’ve found that having an extra facilitator to observe and note-take can bridge the gap.

    Reducing the learning curve of using a new tool.

    While ABTers are becoming accustomed to our new workshop toolsets, there’s a larger learning curve for our clients. 

    We’ve found a tool called Miro that mimics in-person white board sessions as closely as possible, making it simple for clients to catch on. Miro uses digital Post-its that users can post to a virtual whiteboard. 

    Some of Miro’s features make it even more pleasant to use than pen and paper. For example, fonts automatically scale to fit the Post-it. 

    We may also use Lucidchart for business process flow charting and mind mapping.

    Generally speaking, we try to do as much as possible in a single tool so clients only have to learn to use one.

    Thinking on the fly.

    As remote facilitators are under extra pressure to keep the group involved, virtual workshops require some thinking on the fly. We’ve found that having a structured document ready facilitates quick thinking.

    Traditionally we would start an in-person workshop with a blank whiteboard. However, we find the virtual process runs more smoothly if we pre-populate as much as possible to start. 

    As you can see in the above Miro example, we have a visual for everyone to look at from the get-go to boost engagement and keep the ball rolling. 

    So what’s the key to remote workshops?

    All in all, we’ve been able to create a remote workshop experience that engages our clients and creates a solid basis for development projects.

    The key to this success is planning ahead. We conducted practice workshops internally to test new tools, prepopulated virtual whiteboards to facilitate the process, and continue to take notes on wins and failures to further optimize the process.

    Spending a few minutes thinking about what you want to do and how you can do it is extremely valuable!

  • Leveraging NLP for Better Survey Data & Customer Satisfaction

    How often have you found yourself frustrated when answering a survey? Perhaps you were not presented with an option that covered your case or enabled you to raise your concern. Maybe you wished for a place to provide more detailed information.

    In either of these situations, that firm could not get useful information to improve your experience with them.

    Why Should I Include More Open-Ended Survey Questions?

    While multiple choice responses are straight-forward to analyze with clear trends in responses, it only leaves room for answers to questions that the survey writer anticipated. This is okay for some questions, such as yes or no, how many times, Likert ratings, or questions with only a few possible responses.

    For other questions, like “how do you feel about our product?”, it’s nearly impossible to anticipate any adjective a person would want to use.

    Furthermore, with multiple choice for such a question you are limiting responses in a way that manipulates data. You could lead the survey taker into submitting a misleading response by forcing their selection into predetermined categories.

    Multiple choice questions can help you identify a problem, but they rarely provide enough insight to help you solve the problem.

    Open-ended questions allow respondents to provide answers in their own words, focusing on what is important to them. With no restrictions on their response, you can identify new issues that you would not have thought to include in your questions.

    In addition, this kind of open text feedback will often contain information about context (in which circumstances an event occurred) and additional detail (exactly what happened).

    The Challenge With Open-Ended Question Analysis

    While open-ended questions can provide a wealth of meaningful information, it takes a great deal of time to analyze them properly. In fact, User Researcher and founding partner of Adaptive Path Indi Young, plans for 8 to 10 hours of analysis time for every hour of recorded interviews or text read at natural speed. We have found this estimate to be realistic.

    Why does it take so long? It takes time because you don’t know what you are looking for – you will know the valuable nuggets when you see them, but only analyzing all the data will provide the patterns to reveal them. To do this, you have to:

    • Go through every word in the responses
    • Identify the topics that are mentioned
    • Identify the labels people are using to distinguish those topics
    • Map different labels people use for the same things
    • Repeat the process for adjectives and modifiers
    • Identify how they feel about these topics, positive, negative, or neutral
    • Discern contexts that clarify the meanings
    • Extract relevant details that can be used in developing solutions

    This process may seem like overkill – if you have a dozen or two short responses most people can read through them and take away one or two key points. However, if you have hundreds of responses, or the respondent can go into detail and provide longer answers, then you rapidly obtain more information than can be usefully processed merely by reading through them.

    A structured analysis, aggregating the detailed responses from many participants, can reveal insights that might easily be missed in small samples. However, few firms have the resources to provide that kind of analysis on hundreds or even thousands of responses.

    When to Incorporate Natural Language Processing for Surveys

    Fortunately, machine learning-enabled algorithms have developed to the point where much of this analysis can be automated. The process is called Natural Language Processing, or NLP for short. While it can’t do everything listed above, NLP can be of great assistance in two major areas: 1) Topic Analysis (what people are talking about), and 2) Sentiment Analysis (how they feel about those topics).

    Using NLP to perform that preliminary work of topic and sentiment analysis can give the research team a great head start and allow them to instead focus on what human experts do best – assimilate those results and then look at the contextual information and details to glean valuable insights. Furthermore, it reduces human error and bias.

    A Real-World Example With Amazon Comprehend

    During the Discovery phase of projects, Atlantic BT frequently uses surveys to conduct user research. Recently, we needed to analyze responses in a survey performed as a part of brand research for a pharmacy school.

    In this instance, Atlantic BT was working with 800 responses from hundreds of participants. At an average of one minute per response, simply reading through all these would take 13.5 hours, or two full days. And that’s before performing any analysis – remember the point above about proper analysis taking 8 to 10 times longer? That would mean that a fully manual analysis of that content would take three weeks!

    Instead, we chose to use Natural Language Processing to perform the basic topic and sentiment analysis, which allowed our research team to rapidly identify key areas to focus on and research more fully. We chose Amazon Comprehend as the NLP tool to use.

    Why We Chose Amazon Comprehend

    Amazon Comprehend is a service that uses machine learning to draw insights from text. You could use this tool to identify positive or negative connotation or to pick out specific phrases within responses. According to Amazon, full capabilities include:

    • Identifying the language of text
    • Extracting key phrases, places, people, brands, or events
    • Understanding how positive or negative text is
    • Analyzes text using tokenization and parts of speech
    • Automatically organizes a collection of text files by topic
    • Building custom sets of entities or text classification models that are unique to your organization

    As Atlantic BT is an Amazon partner, we find that Amazon Comprehend is compatible with our other toolsets, is continually being improved, and is very cost effective.

    What We Learned Through Natural Language Processing Analysis

    Once the full analysis was complete, Atlantic BT’s user research team was able to draw conclusions that helped drive a website redesign and content strategy.

    Eight major topics were identified as reasons for wanting to attend this pharmacy school. Further research, such as cross-validating these insights with other sources such as search terms, Reddit and other methods, enabled us to refine our insights around these topics. Understanding the motivation behind prospective students in selecting a school and program is critical to boosting the conversion rate of these low-volume, high-value transactions of both applying to a school and finally selecting that school from those that approved their application.

    Just a few examples of the insights gained include:

    • Deep Motivations: While things such as national rankings are of obvious importance, we learned more about how motivations and decisions were shaped by a key influencer in the applicant’s life; the stories related in the responses were extremely helpful in identifying content topics which would resonate with and reinforce those motivations. These factors often influence decisions around programs and schools to which they will apply.
    • Natural Environment: While not necessarily something one would think about in selecting a pharmacy school, the comments made it clear that proximity to a lake and other outdoor activities was a differentiator for many applicants. Factors like this can make a large difference in turning an offer into an acceptance – which is very important when most applicants have been accepted by multiple schools.
    • Multiple Value Propositions: Students must now make a complex return on investment calculation when considering their career options against student debt. Things such as dual-degree programs could save a year of education, a variety of programs can offer opportunities to improve specialization in the field of pharmacy and thus expand career opportunities. Responses identified these and more as important decision points.

    These types of themes were leveraged to create engaging content, matching the needs and motivations of prospective students towards the end goal of increasing quality applications and acceptance into the pharmacy school.

    Need Help Conducting User Research?

    Atlantic BT is well-versed in user research; conducting user and stakeholder surveys is just one phase of our Discovery process. Contact us to learn more about our UX Research and Design services.

  • Accessibility and Section 508 Compliance: Planning, Testing, and Design

    There are many different pieces to obtaining digital accessibility, and it can be an issue that needs clarification. Atlantic BT can help you feel confident that your site is in compliance with the latest accessibility regulations to reach a larger, more inclusive audience for your company.

    But let’s take a step back and think about why it matters. Digital spaces are essential to the way we live our lives. “We” is a collective, inclusive word. So digital solutions wind up affecting the lives of every person who has access to the Internet. It is clear that designing web experiences for all users, regardless of ability or potential needs, is a crucial component of modern web design. Not to mention, it is also the law. Web accessibility is an element of your website that can not be ignored.

    Why Should You Care About Website Accessibility?

    Americans With Disabilities Act

    While the ADA does not explicitly mention websites in its language, it does prohibit discrimination based on disability in places of public accommodation. As many organizations have discovered, the ADA has been applied to lawsuits over inaccessible websites. Perhaps one of the most famous was the National Federation of the Blind’s lawsuit against Target in the mid-2000’s, which led to Target settling the case for $6 million.

    Section 508

    Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, is another law that many of our clients have their eyes on. Organizations that are subject to Section 508 have a clear requirement to meet accessibility standards. As of January 2018, these organizations are now required to make sure their websites meet the guidelines laid out in Level A and Level AA of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 (WCAG 2.0).

    Appeal to a Wider Audience

    Aside from the law, there are benefits to making your website more inclusive.

    • Provides key services to people with disabilities
    • Increases the audience or customer base an organization can reach through its website
    • Often makes sites easier for all users

    And the need for accessibility continues to grow. According to the CDC, more than 20% of adults in the United States have a disability. That number is only likely to go up as the population ages.

    How We Create Accessible Websites

    Making accessible websites requires careful planning for success. Of course, not all of our clients have the same accessibility needs, so each is handled on a case by case basis. A typical project looks something like this:

    Make an Accessibility Plan

    During our discovery phase, we identify what accessibility requirements a client has. We will additionally scan for issues that we will need to mitigate later on. For example, a lot of old sites have videos and PDFs that no longer meet accessibility guidelines. Whatever the specifics may be, sticking to the initial audit ensures we know what goals we need to meet.

    [pull_quote]Technology’s value lies in what it allows people to do. By designing inclusively and making digital products accessible to all users, we make our technology more valuable. We bring this perspective to every project which makes our products that much stronger.[/pull_quote]    – Gordon Chadwick, User Researcher, CPACC

    Design a Site Everyone Can Use

    With requirements in hand, our designers apply styles that both function and delight. We’re long past the days when people thought designing an accessible website meant designing an ugly website.

    [pull_quote]Accessibility isn’t just about blind users and screen readers, it is about everyone. Designing for all people encourages exploration of new ideas and solutions that lead to a better product overall.[/pull_quote]  – Maris Hall, User Experience Designer, CPACC

    Develop Using Best Practices

    Building accessible sites doesn’t mean bolting on tons of features, it means following best practices for front end development. Clean, well-structured code is the foundation that allows screen readers and other assistive technology to function.

    [pull_quote]When you start paying attention to the needs of all of your users, you begin to see how wonderfully diverse your audience is and you start looking for ways to give everyone a seat at the table. Since I’m usually working on implementation, I make sure the sites I build provide a good experience for users of assistive technologies like screen readers or magnifiers. [/pull_quote]   – Mark Andrews, JavaScript Developer

    Test and Verify

    Testing is how we ensure that the work we did meets the goals we set during the planning stage of a project. Since meeting success criteria is of critical importance, our testers have several different ways to verify that we hit the mark. Testing methods include:

    • Automated Testing – We use automated checkers to identify accessibility issues in your code.
    • Expert Reviews – Certified accessibility professionals review behavior on your site.
    • User Testing – Go straight to the source and test with users who have disabilities.

    [pull_quote]There is a wealth of information on the web and everyone should have equal access to it. I make sure that we’re making that a reality by accounting for accessibility as we build things instead of after they get released.[/pull_quote]    – Yolanda Hyman, Quality Assurance Manager

    Start Feeling Good About Accessibility

    It’s easy to understand why accessibility is important. However, uncovering potential issues and implementing changes can be a complicated process. Atlantic BT is happy to guide you through requirements and implement the necessary changes to make your website not only compliant, but accessible and inviting to all users. Reach out today for a free consultation or to get in touch with one of our accessibility experts. 

  • Building Brand Credibility With Visual Design

    Building Brand Credibility With Visual Design

    Think about a brand you experienced in the past that made you feel happy. It could be a one-time thing, or maybe it’s a brand you’ve interacted with frequently. Think about the things that made you feel this way, like delightful products, friendly customer service, or honest communication. Brands can have a powerful impact on people’s lives and emotions, and it’s safe to say that they don’t go in hoping for a substandard experience.

    Similar to a walking inside a store, your website or application is one of many gateways for your audience to engage with your brand. How do you think your audience feels about your brand right now?

    Branding demands commitment. It demands a commitment to connect with people and stir their emotions. It demands a commitment to imagination. Many brands are only given one shot to engage people. Regardless of what you believe, people will quickly evaluate you and your brand when looking at your website or application.

    The care you put into your website and brand reflect the attention you put into your product and services. Consider this: if your content is valuable, someone might assume you believe in clear communication, honesty, and care for customers. If your content is wasteful, contains broken links, or is surrounded by confusing navigation, someone might assume you lack a commitment to quality. Don’t do the latter.

    Establishing and growing a brand—including a website or application —takes careful craftsmanship, commitment, and dedication. Brands are organic in nature, so they need to be cared for over time or they’ll eventually die off. The way in which you approach branding can allow you to speak volumes about your priorities, culture, trustworthiness, and level of expertise.

    Nike—first and foremost—promotes beauty in their products to build brand credibility.

    Is Visual Appeal Enough to Create a Trustworthy Brand?

    Are there any intrinsic biases that we have as a species that prevent us from making calculated and good decisions? Yes, there are. Mainly beauty.

    Beauty can influence whether we decide to walk into a store in person or explore deeper into a store online. It’s quite fascinating to observe how our behaviors and inclinations translate between offline and online existences.

    As aesthetically-oriented humans, we are psychologically hardwired to trust beautiful people. In fact, research conducted by the University of Melbourne found that visually attractive websites or applications were perceived as more trustworthy than those that were unattractive.

    Credibility begins with aesthetics. Whether or not a website or application has credible content, a beautiful user interface can give people the impression that the brand pays attention to detail and quality.

    If your organization does not value design at its core, your brand—and your organization—will inevitably fail.

    However, visual appeal alone isn’t enough to make your brand trustworthy. Beauty is only skin deep, right? The largest source of frustration from people on the web is the inability to find the right information. What’s important here is that your website or application should not only have a professional appearance, but also should have both logical structure and friendly navigation.

    Connecting Brand Value to Real People

    Pretty website or application—check. Logical structure—check. Friendly navigation—check. Valuable content—uh oh! Ultimately people will still struggle to get what they came for if your content isn’t written properly and adds value.

    Common Reasons Your Content Fails:

    • It’s too vague, complex, or full of jargon.
    • It’s either too shallow or too full of meaningless words.
    • It’s incorrect, outdated, or unverified.
    • It’s simply boring.
    • Timing is off: it’s not customized to a user’s journey.

    Even if you have information perfectly aligned the way your audience wants it, timing can also determine a content’s value. Providing the right amount of information at the right time is the key. A solid content strategy can help your brand find the right balance, presenting users with highly relevant information depending on their pain points.

    Characteristics of Effective Content:

    • Speaks to the human reader.
    • Tells the reader what they need to know, when they need to know it.
    • Reduces confusion through consistent, concise wording.
    • Provides value and freshness.

    Additionally, where appropriate, effective content shows personality, telling the audience that the brand has the capacity to truly appreciate what matters the most to people.

    Simple & Effective Ways to Build Brand Credibility

    With passion and attention to detail, you can design a website or application that expresses your brand while building credibility. Let’s go over a few of the commonly-used, proven design principles that can help build that brand credibility.

    Design “with people”—not “for people”

    It’s important to understand your audience and what their objectives are so that you can connect with them. Are they here to perform an action? Soak up information? Interact with a particular process? Rather than making risky assumptions, design alongside your audience to meet their needs. It’s not only good practice to be more inclusive with them, but it will also add more credibility to your brand if they feel like they are being heard.

    I believe as creative professionals, it’s not only important for us to run designs through tests to get a quantitative measure, but also to test qualitatively with humans who will actually use the end-product.

    Provide Clear Navigation

    Whether it’s a website or an application, navigation is one of the critical ways to allow your audience to discover your brand’s products, services, and information they seek. Every action a person takes with your brand has risk.
    Your audience may be saying:

    • Is what I’m looking for here? No, wait… there? Umm…
    • How does this work? Ohh… is this clickable?
    • Where am I at? Ugh, forget it – I’ll google it.

    Is your audience willing to take a risk and explore deeper into your brand to find value, or will they become frustrated and leave? Is your brand willing to take a chance on that? Good labeling practices can alleviate those risks.

    Everything should be organized and labeled in a meaningful way that makes the most sense to your audience. Stick with conventions and do not get overly creative, unless you want to risk hindering brand exploration and reduce brand confidence.

    Don’t Sacrifice Usability for SEO

    Believe me, the last thing you want to do is write your content in such a way that’s only meant for a robot—e.g. Google—to read. Search engines are great at understanding the type of information you have, however, they cannot decide whether your brand is worth buying into. Only people can decide that.

    Focus on a people-first content strategy and allow your brand to speak naturally to your audience. Search engine optimization (SEO) should not dictate your message. Instead, use keyword research to see what topics your audience is interested in, and hold off on optimization until this human-centric content has been written.

    Present Information at the Appropriate Time

    It’s important to guide your audience through every step of their journey efficiently. Throughout their journeys, information needs will vary. For example, a user may begin by trying to see if you offer the services they need. On another visit, they may be interested in learning about your company’s processes. If you deliver all of this information at once, the user could be overwhelmed or discouraged with difficulty finding the information they need. On the other hand, not showing enough information can make you look like you’re hiding something.

    As part of your content strategy, consider the context you’re presenting to your audience and disperse your information accordingly.

    Delight Your Users Whenever Possible

    Delighting your audience may vary depending on the industry you are in, but make no mistake, great design can and should delight all the same. Whether it’s the subtle animation of a button, the unique style of a photo filter, or the clever integration of a Konami code easter egg— plan something different to surprise your audience with.

    Often times, it’s the little things that make the most impact, while showing there are real people behind your brand. We’re all human—so let your brand connect with us.

    Final Thoughts on Branding

    Branding is about creating a difference, adding value, and connecting with people. Life’s purpose is the same thing, right? What story will your life—your brand—tell people next.

    This article was originally posted by Mark Riggan on Medium. 

  • The Top 5 Things You Can Do to Improve Your Website Speed

    A colleague just shared a URL with you, his message reading “you gotta check this out!” The URL promises to lead you to a beautiful new website for a company that created a software tool that could save your life. You eagerly click the link and wait. One, two, three seconds go by as the page struggles to load. Before your frustration gains any more momentum, you close the page. Sound familiar?

    This example illustrates why site speed analysis should be STEP ONE of every conversion optimization project. And as the Internet becomes even more entwined in our work, entertainment, and everything else, your customers will become even less patient for any delay in opening your page.

    Before launching into ways to improve the speed of your website, here’s one key note about website speed: there’s a difference between Page Load Time and Page Interactive Time. Page Load Time means “the length of time until every element on the page is done loading”, while Page Interactive Time means “length of time until the site is usable.” The latter is the more important metric to pay attention to.

    Now, here are the top causes of site-slowing and what you can do to fix them:

    #1: Optimize Your Images

    Large images are the culprit for a lot of the ‘weight’ of many websites. Website weight, for our purposes, is measured in bytes—the fewer bytes the browser has to download, the faster the download can happen and the more quickly your users will see your content. This is a great argument for optimizing how you use images on your site.

    First, it’s important to consider how essential each image is to the success of your website. Well-placed images can communicate loads of information, but make sure every one of them is worth the real estate. Also, if you ever find yourself encoding text in an image asset, stop and reconsider. Text-in-images delivers a poor user experience – the text is not selectable, not searchable, not zoomable, nor accessible. Web fonts are always a better choice for text.

    Once you’ve chosen the most important images for your site, make sure their size isn’t adding a ton of weight for your website to load. There are dozens of tools you can use to adjust image size, but here is a short list:

    • Photoshop – open your image and choose the “Save for Web” option. The program includes an image quality slider so you can see the visual trade-offs.
    • Smush.it – this is a free online uploader that creates a zip archive of your optimized images.
    • Kraken – subscription-based image optimization software.

    #2: Compress Your Website Files

    Compressing your website will increase site speed by reducing the size of the HTTP response. You may need help to address this because both compression and deflation happen on the server side. The most common compression solution is GZIP and fortunately, almost all web servers support it. To see if your website is already GZIPPED, run this simple test: GIDZipTest. If you’re curious about how GZIP works, check out this video by the Google Webmasters themselves.

    #3: Use a Content Delivery Network

    A Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a distributed system of servers which are deployed over multiple data centers across the Internet. A CDN serves content to users from the most highly available server in order to deliver the best performance. This makes a CDN a great speed improvement if you have a high traffic website. Some of the most popular CDNs include:

    • Amazon CloudFront
    • MaxCDN
    • CacheFly
    • CloudFlare

    In addition to serving content from a CDN, you should also serve your static content (images, javascript, and CSS files) from a cookieless domain, backed by a CDN. Why cookieless domains? Every time a browser sends an HTTP request, it has to send all associated cookies that have been set for that domain and path along with it. Because static files don’t need to be accompanied by cookies, you can decrease latency by serving these static resources from a cloud domain that doesn’t serve cookies. You can accomplish this by using Amazon CloudFront or Rackspace.

    #4: Implement Browser Caching

    The browser cache is a temporary storage location on a user’s computer which stores files downloaded to display your website. The user’s browser can display your website faster by retrieving your site’s images, stylesheets, javascript, or multimedia content from the cache rather than having to download all this content again when they come back to your site.

    To ensure your site uses cached files, you may need your hosting provider to help you install a caching solution. Here are the top three caching programs:

    • Redis
    • CloudFlare
    • Memcached

    While we’re talking about hosting providers, it’s worth noting that not all web hosts are created equal. Indeed, many of the top web hosts include all the server-side speed optimization services you need. If you have a decent amount of traffic, skip the budget web hosts and research which hosting provider best suits your needs.

    #5: Minimize Redirects

    There are several types of redirects, all useful when you want to point a user’s browser to a different URL. The most widely used, a 301 redirect, is the preferred way to change your site structure without losing valuable SEO. The downside is that lots of redirects stacked together will confuse the browser, slowing it down as it wades through the old destinations to get the new ones.


    The Lazy Optimizer’s Guide to Accelerating Your Website

    If these steps seem overwhelming, there is a quick and easy path: Google provides expert advice on exactly what’s slowing your pages down and what you should do to fix the issues using its Page Speed Insights tool. Just type in your URL and the tool will ‘score’ your site speed on mobile and desktop.

    On the Internet, things change all the time, and these best practices are no exception. To get the latest and greatest tips on website speed, check out the Google Developers guide. Happy optimizing!

  • Ten Critical Elements of a Successful Retail eCommerce Site

    It’s no secret that eCommerce is both extremely successful and extremely competitive. How does a site gain market share, loyal customers and revenue? It may seem mystical — lots of smart people have created good sites and not been successful.

    The example I will use to illustrate the 10 critical elements is www.extremeterrain.com. I happen to also be an off-road enthusiast and this site caught my attention by how well it is put together. Our company didn’t build the site and we aren’t affiliated with it at all. It is impressive work, however.

    This post doesn’t deal with anything related to marketing or actual fulfillment or customer service. Let’s assume that you won’t be successful if nobody comes to your site or you deliver really lousy service. Agree?

    As you read through this list you notice a consistent theme. Trust. People very rarely do business with anyone they don’t trust. Most of the keys to successful eCommerce are related to establishing trust with the consumer. Trust in the company and trust in the product.

    1. Precise, Targeted, Unique Emails on a Regular Schedule

    Successful e-commerce sites use e-mail. A lot. So what’s different? Lots of people use spammy communications to try and drum up business for everything from drugs to Groupon specials.

    Successful e-commerce mailing appears in your inbox as something very interesting and targeted specifically for you. Looking at the email below you will notice how many times they use the information they gathered about me to precisely target the email. “2009 Wrangler” is used in the subject, the header, and the sub-heading above the targeted product listing. Exciting Wrangler imaging is, of course, also used as the primary e-mail image.

    Picture12. Big, Detailed, Consistent Pictures

    One of the things that makes customers hesitate to buy, even if they think they want the product, is a lack of confidence about the quality or whether it’s really exactly what they want. Having big, detailed, consistent pictures closes the gap from an in-store experience significantly and increases the buyer’s confidence that it’s what they are looking for. Where all the other sites simply have decent picture of the product. Extreme Terrain goes way above. They actually install the products on a Jeep and show how they look. In addition they allow their customers to post photos of their rigs with the products installed. It’s a home run. Who doesn’t want this parked in the garage?

    Picture9

    Picture10

    3. Clear Descriptions

    Just like having big pictures, clear descriptions help buyer to understand what they are really getting. This lessens their concern they are going to get something they don’t want. It doesn’t matter whether they can ship it back or not, most people don’t want to hassle with the process.

    ExtremeTerrain provides 4 different tabs with detailed information about the product so the customer knows exactly what to expect.

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    4. Targeted Focus

    Ok, let’s face the facts. This post isn’t about creating Amazon.com. Unless you have a spare billion and think you’re smarter than they are, you should probably choose a niche and stick to it. Once you choose that niche make sure it’s big enough that you can focus precisely on it without expanding in order to grow your revenue. Once you lose focus, you’re out in the tall grass without a GPS.

    Extreme Terrain isn’t just about 4×4 parts in general. It is specifically about Jeep Wranglers. They probably have a mission statement somewhere about being the most complete and most trusted online resource for Jeep Wranglers anywhere.  Small enough to get their arms around, but big enough to do one heck of a lot of business.

    5. Real Reviews

    Consumers can spot a fake review a thousand miles away. Fake reviews detract from trust and detract from conversions. Data actually shows that bad reviews boost sales. Read about it here (http://hbr.org/2012/03/bad-reviews-can-boost-sales-heres-why).

    The point is that reviews increase confidence and increase trust and that increases sales. Seeing a pattern here?

    Look how well Extreme Terrain does at displaying reviews. They are also in the main part of the page, near the add to cart and pricing. There are stars all over the page. Of course in order to display reviews you also have to be good at capturing reviews and enticing customers to leave them.

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    6. Clean Design, Organized Navigation

    Don’t make your customers work to find what they are looking for. Good user experience is a must. You can get away with a few mistakes but once a user feels like it’s a struggle to get around then they associate the difficulty of the shopping experience with frustration and other negative thoughts and as you can probably imagine this doesn’t lead to happy customers.

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    7. Good Search

    What makes a good search? First it should be prominent and easy to find. Second, the search should be contextual so search terms are suggested as you type. Third, the search catalog should contain all of the site’s pages; products, blogs, and static/informational. Finally, when the search results contain products the site should display images, descriptions, price, and reviews. It isn’t essential but having the ability to refine and sort the results further by price, category, manufacturer, rating, etc. is a nice feature.

    Search has less to do with trust than some of the other items and more to do with common sense. If your customers can’t find what they are looking for then they can’t buy it. Duh. In addition, many merchants fail to capture internal search data so they can see what customers are looking for and perhaps not finding. It helps guide product selection, trends, and even promotions. Google Analytics makes it really easy to wire up so there’s no excuse.

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    8. Subject Matter Experts / Accessible Customer Service

    Going back to trust again. Trust in the product and trust in the company. The more you can help customers to feel confident in what they are purchasing the more they will purchase. Sometimes the mere appearance of accessibility to customer service and focused expertise is enough.

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    9. Affordable Shipping / Simple Return Policy

    People don’t like to pay for shipping because it feels like “tax.” To some extent they don’t mind paying for expedited shipping to get it faster because that’s a choice. I’m no saying shipping should be free, but whenever you can offer free shipping options that’s a huge bonus. Many sites have a minimum order value where shipping becomes free. This has a huge effect on improving the average order size.

    The return policy goes back to trust again. The buyer’s threshold for confidence must be much higher if “all sales are final.” Conversely if you offer a simple, easy return policy customers will consider slightly more risk. Additionally more trust is created if you appear willing and eager to help customers if they are less than satisfied with their purchases. Mostly common sense.

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    10. Mobile Experience

    This simply comes down to data. Lots and lots of customers do their shopping and browsing from mobile devices and tablets. These numbers continue to grow, although slower than they have in the past. It is near suicidal to provide a poor mobile experience to your customers.

    Conclusion

    As you can see, a lot goes into a solid, high-performing eCommerce website. And while it can look overwhelming, the end result is an eCommerce engine that will drive your business in ways you might never have imagined before. Ready to go further with eCommerce? Learn more about how we can help with your eCommerce needs and contact us to talk with an eCommerce expert ready to help you take your business to the next level!