User Research for Membership eCommerce Website

2018

Overview

The insurance and travel company based in the UK introduced a membership program aimed at their existing customers aged over 50 just six months prior to my joining the Digital Marketing team as a Digital User Researcher. The team was well-prepared and enthusiastic about the membership program; however, they struggled in obtaining genuine insights from users, which hindered their ability to develop targeted offerings, enhance the website’s design, and determine the optimal screen size.

They sought to gain insights into the digital behaviours and preferences of this specific age group, which led to my hiring to conduct research and assist the team in making data-driven decisions. My responsibility involved also converting the research outcomes into practical design improvements.

Strategy and Approach

In order to meet the specified objectives, I have developed a comprehensive plan that I have communicated to the team for the following purposes:

• Engage the entire team along with their stakeholders to ensure comprehensive collaboration.
• Develop a tool that facilitates direct user access for ongoing research initiatives.
• Enhance understanding of the needs and preferences of program members, transitioning the team from subjective opinions to an evidence-based methodology.
• Equip the team with effective methods and data to support informed decision-making aimed at enhancing the digital experience.

What I’ve done

1. Desktop Research: Initial findings

Through the collection of data from recent both international and national statistics, I conducted preliminary desktop research to gain insights into the digital behaviours and preferences of consumers aged over 50. Subsequently, I shared the findings and analysis, accompanied by strategic recommendations, with the Digital Marketing management board to involve them in the subsequent phases of research.

2. Direct access to users: Creating the User Research Panel

To organisation faced challenges in connecting with actual users to assess their satisfaction and to collect their needs and preferences. Although the CRM team was established and effectively extracted news and information, there was a lack of a structured approach to gather user insights. Upon my arrival in the team, I proposed the establishment of a User Research Panel to facilitate a rapid, consistent and focused engagement with users.

By liaising with the team, I’ve conducted an analysis of the demographic makeup of the program members, followed by the distribution of invitation batches to the panel in order to achieve a balanced representation. Finally, we have successfully recruited approximately 300 genuine customers expressing their willingness to contribute hence to participate in user testing, surveys, product trials, and other research activities.

Then, as part of the User Research Panel recruitment process, we have run a survey and collected demographic data, social media, devices and product preferences to segment the panellists and improve knowledge about their online behaviour.

Once the User research Panel has been created, it was possible to get in touch with the panelists to gather the aimed feedback and insights the team needed to improve the membership digital experience.

3. Mobile Devices: Correcting existing bias

Among the team there was a prevalent misconception that individuals over the age of 50 do not utilise mobile devices; however, findings from desktop research, along with a subsequent survey conducted among panelists, revealed that this demographic actually favours mobile devices over desktop computers for exploring membership program offerings. Additionally, we conducted a targeted survey to identify the primary tasks they perform on mobile devices, which will help us tailor the user experience more effectively.

The insights gained from this survey prompted a reevaluation of the existing mobile device design, indicated the need of a mobile first approach and suggested the potential need for the creation of a dedicated native application.

4. Strategy and Design: Gathering real users insights on offering and design

I have developed, recruited participants and launched targeted online surveys to obtain a deeper understanding of members behaviours and attitudes about key product-related features. Main surveys covered:

• Validate the effectiveness of the emailed newsletter (Business) and preferred design layout (Design)
• Identify the need to connect the membership programme to the main customer account for introducing membership personalisation offers (Business and Design)

• Preferred offers categories and sub-categories identify products preferences, attracts and retain members (Business) and also to improve the navigation experience (Design).

5. Translating findings: from Interaction Design to User testing

Based on prior research studies that concentrated on device and offer categorisation, I have developed recommendations pertaining to information architecture and navigation systems, subsequently creating appropriate user journeys and wireframes tailored for small-screen mobile devices.

Ultimately, the in-house UI designer has created a clickable prototype base on the wireframes. Then I’ve recruited, planned and conducted usability testing on desktop live and mobile devices with Lookback.io. The test results have delivered comprehensive feedback to the Digital Marketing team, which facilitated the implementation of pertinent design enhancements.

Conclusions

After six months, as a result of delivered approach and activities, the team was provided with deep understanding of their customers and members behaviours and attitudes. By creating and using the User Research Panel I’ve been able to empower the team to get instant, focused and real insights by launching research studies, which led to engage stakeholders with highly qualitative and quantitative data. In addition, the studies results have been translated into design to improve the user experience accordingly.