Work » Best Buy: Be our guest
Best Buy Co., Inc is North America's number-one specialty retailer of consumer electronics, personal computers, entertainment software and appliances.
Strategy
Best Buy was losing thousands of sales as customers were mysteriously abandoning the checkout process before completing their order. Customer Care was fielding calls from upset customers who were unable to add shipping addresses and were tired of vague error messages and failed attempts.
A strategy was set in place to review the current process, do an intense competitive analysis and engage customers using an in-house usability lab. An increase in conversion rate, a decrease in abandonment rate and a reduction in customer care order inquiries were determined to be the key measures of success.
Research
Through 5 days of directed usability testing, task analysis of current checkout processes (both online and in Best Buy's retail stores) and another round of testing using paper prototypes to introduce new design ideas, 5 key areas were uncovered:
- Many customers were only entering the checkout process to view final shipping and tax charges.
- Many customers could not remember their username and password, even after username/password reminder emails
- Others stopped at the Create Account page as they didn't trust Best Buy to permanently store their details and protect their privacy.
- The address verification system was errantly rejecting addresses for new housing estates (i.e. many in the market for big ticket items)
- Customers found error messaging confusing and unhelpful. Messages were too matter-of-fact and did not offer next steps.
Design
The following key designs were implemented:
- Through process and page flow design, estimated shipping (all levels) and tax were brought up to the Cart page, prior to clicking Checkout.
- Through process design and tight cooperation with technical teams, guest checkout was implemented, giving customers the choice to store details or proceed anonymously.
- Once again working closely with developers, the address verification issue was solved by changing the address feed from weekly to daily.
- Using defensive design techniques and working with copywriters, a new error messaging standard was introduced which clearly summarised the error and offered actionable advise to remedy the issue
Impact
After a month's worth of data, the results were in:
- .10 improved conversion rate resulting in thousands of orders daily
- 10% decrease in checkout abandonment
- 40% reduction in customer care calls
- Over 35% of customers choose to use the guest checkout route
The project also repositioned Best Buy from the bottom quartile to the top quartile in Keynote's 2004 Customer Experience Rankings.