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Executive Design + UX Leader | Advisor | Speaker
The Home Depot
This case study tells the story of how we solved for the evolution of fulfillment options on the product information page (PIP). An "Oscar Goes To Moment" where Design influenced thinking, broke down silos, created an interdependent team sport and delivered significant business value for the company.
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Summary
Role: Executive sponsor, decider, coach and player
Vision: Use design as a guiding philosophy to rethink one of the most important, and complex sections of the site, the Buy Belt
Team Size: 20 (Design Thinking facilitators, researchers, designers, content strategists, product managers, engineering, business stakeholders)
Investment: $75,000
Timing: 4 day Sprint, 6 months of testing
Identifying The Problems
Constraints
Record Scratch Moment
To gain buy in with our partners, we needed to communicate the customer impact if we didn't address the current state of the Buy Belt (the section of the page that represents delivery and a call to action/decision for purchase).
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Fulfillment strategy had evolved. The types of fulfillment offerings increased, new payment methods emerged and the experience was not optimized for mobile.
To add further complexity, we partnered with our product owners early and identified 16 concurrent projects that intersect with the fulfillment redesign project that affected PLP (Product List Page), PIP and Cart.
There are over 70+ configurations of what fulfillment can look like on a PIP.
Through stakeholder interviews, we discovered that there was no shared vision of the fulfillment structure across the company. Moreover, customer vision, product owners' vision, and supply chain's visions didn't match.
Mapping The Experience
The discovery stage of this project was the longest and the most difficult part of the project. Working in a tremendous, cross-functional and highly matrixed infrastructure like The Home Depot demanded that we look at the problem from multiple angles and perspectives.
We soon discovered there was massive disconnect and vision misalignment. Our goal was to first create empathy and create a shared understanding with customers, product owners and supply chain.
The Research
Our research showed that choosing a fulfillment option is a critical decision point for The Home Depot's customers. Many of our users shopped by a project and not product, buying many items at one time. It's crucial for them to purchase these items at the same time and preferably the same way.
Methods: Baseline studies, competitive analysis, surveys, feature-specific user tests, and interviews with our customers to understand their needs, wants, frustrations and behaviors.
Ivan, 33
"Can this item be delivered, other than by express delivery, to my home? If so, how long will it take and how much will it cost?"
John, 42
"If this merchandise is unavailable because it is out of stock, it should say that it is out of stock instead of putting an option for Express Delivery as it has been for a month.”
Sabrina, 56
"Well, now when I'm seeing my item in the Cart I see that Ship to Home is not available and you chose something else for me, but it costs 80 bucks so I better go to the store to pick it up. That is not a type of surprise I want to see when I'm ready to checkout."
How Might We
Reframing The Problem
We conducted eight 30-minutes interviews with stakeholders. As a part of the process, each participant wrote down "how might we" statements on sticky notes to document the problem areas. Upon completion, we performed affinity diagramming and created a list of critical opportunities to enhance the customer experience.
Fulfillment options that are available to customers are not 100% transparent or consistent throughout the Home Depot shopping experience. Customers have different needs depending on the product or timing, “the speed of the need”.
Knowing this, "how might we" create a customized fulfillment experience that displays the right options at the right time in order to maximize order conversion?
Analog Prototyping & Ideation
We started, tested and iterated with "drag and drop" paper prototypes, then quickly moved to Invision prototypes that we tested again with users.
The Sprint
The Approach
Concepts & User Testing
Concept 1
"Laffy Taffy"
Concept 2
"Soft Serve"
Concept 3
"Nano Tiles"
Validation & Findings
To validate our concepts, we conducted nine one hour-long moderated interviews through usertesting.com. Five for desktop and four for mobile. During the sessions, each user got to see all three concepts in randomized order. At the end of the session, we asked users to provide two votes for the concepts: one for the first choice and one for the second choice.
Laffy Taffy
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Checkmarks make the design very clear, along with the orange box, that the option is selected
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The colors, messaging, icons, and typography sizing helps to break up the content
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Instant Checkout is noticed when it appears/disappears based on fulfillment selection
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Soft Serve
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Layout allows for quick scanning; easier to follow the fulfillment options
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Most liked how “Want it today?” was nested; it made sense and was easy to understand
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Easily understood that icons are selectable
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Design didn’t feel cluttered
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Nano Tiles
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Easy to notice all three fulfillment options
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Everyone understood the icons were selectable
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The orange filled in icon plus green check mark confirmed their selection
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Users liked that they could change the delivery area if needed
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Iterate & Refine
After analyzing what worked well in each of the concepts, we believed there was further opportunity to refine the design and experience. We pushed the thinking further and asked, what do our customers really need to know to be able to compare their options easily?
Price
Pickup vs. Delivery
Speed
This was the a-ha moment. We decided to keep those three key points inside of the tiles. This approach gave us the opportunity to be very explicit about details for the available fulfillment options.
As a result, we landed a simple concept that highlights the three options and is easy to scan and compare. In addition, users are able to click "Add to Cart" with the default fulfillment option and make a decision later in cart.
Production
Press Release & Outcomes
The team delivered in support of the broader Inventory & Delivery strategy for The Home Depot and e-commerce business by reducing customer friction and highlighting a fulfillment scale of Free-to-Fast with and showcasing the cheapest and fastest delivery options for our customer.
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