The client brief
As part of this case study, Sarah Jones, VP of interactive for Nordstrom, has engaged our team with the intention of redesigning the current Nordstrom ecommerce site. She wants the new site to feel inspirational and upscale. It’s also important that we create a robust, performant experience on mobile web, as more and more ecomm shoppers complete their purchases on their phones. Sarah is looking for our team to advise on our approach.
Summary of today’s agenda
Provide a summary of the provided case study
Highlight preliminary questions regarding the client brief
Clarify any assumptions made in approaching the assignment
Define the scope of the assignment
Provide an overview of the approach to the case study
Provide a general roadmap with assumed prioritization based on earlier clarified inputs
Some preliminary questions...
What initiated the desire for a site redesign? What’s broken?
What research do we have that proves the site isn’t working? What are our current KPIs measuring site performance and how are we tracking? How have we defined our key metrics (e.g. engagement, CTR, transfer rate)?
What user and market research have we conducted to confirm that now is the time for a redesign? Are we seeing an influx of mobile users amongst our own user groups or some other change in user behavior?
Have we tried optimizing the current experience? What have we learned from those exercises?
How do our users currently engage with the site?
Define the current digital ecosystem for the site. How are we driving traffic to the site? Where are users coming from (paid media, organic search, direct, RM, social)?
What is our current technology stack (CMS, Data Analytics (Adobe Analytics, ClickTail, Power BI, etc.), Experimentation (Adobe Target, AEM, Optimizely), Lead Generation (Marketo), User Research (User Testing, Optimal Workshop) or site survey tools (Comsore, Survey Monkey,etc.) ?
I made some assumptions to define the project scope.
We have an established digital strategy and understand the position of the website in the ecosystem.
We have validated that a redesign is necessary with user and market research
There is no brand consultation/workshopping necessary. Client desires to retain existing brand elements and will provide all digital asset collateral required in the construction of the web redesign, including all brand guidelines, style guides and existing marketing collateral. Agency will not provide photoshoot services.
Client intends to retain current backend systems. CMS platform will be retained and technical requirements are defined and can be made available to the design team.
We have an established process with the client and have identified all roles and responsibilities via a RACI.
All modes of communication have been clarified and defined. Communication platforms for internal teams exist.
The company
What is Nordstorm?
Nordstrom, Inc. is an American luxury department store chain. It originated as a shoe store and evolved into a full-line retailer with departments for clothing, footwear, handbags, jewelry, accessories, cosmetics, fragrances and home goods.
Nordstrom ships to over 200 countries/regions worldwide.*
The category
What is happening in the category?
The COVID pandemic has shifted e-commerce in 2020. Across the world, people are shifting buying habits and the lockdown has even hit boomers by forcing them to shop online – some for the first time. COVID has accelerated the e-commerce industry’s growth and more businesses are joining the e-commerce business revolution than ever before. (Forbes, Aug 1, 2020)
14% growth in eCommerce
eCommerce growth is still outpacing overall retail growth at 14.1% versus 4%. 2019 online holiday sales reached $138 billion. This figure represents a year-over-year increase of 12.7% (“eCommerce Trends in 2020: The Future Is Now,” Magento, 2020)
U.S. e-commerce sales will hit about 14.5% of total U.S. retail sales, up about 11% of total retail sales, since 2019. (“US Ecommerce 2020: Coronavirus Boosts Ecommerce Forecast and Will Accelerate Channel-Shift,” eMarketer, June 2020)
Self-care is the move, but make it fashion.
Both food and beverage and health, personal care and beauty were the fastest-growing ecommerce categories prior to the pandemic. Forecast for food and beverage sales increased from 23.4% to 58.5% and health, personal care and beauty sales from 16.6% to 32.4%, but...
...fashion remains the most popular category of all internet purchases. Of the total ecommerce expenditure worldwide in 2020, consumers are forecast to spend $596.1 billion on fashion-related products---25.8 percent of the expected ecommerce revenue worldwide in 2020, (Statista)
The customer / users
What are our customers experiencing?
Although American optimism is recovering, consumers remain worried about spending and safety during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.
Most consumers remain mindful of “discretionary” spending and plan to maintain or reduce spending during upcoming holidays.
With continued pressure on household income, consumers are trying new brands and channels, seeking both better value and convenience. Compared to last year, consumers are more than three times as likely to trade down to lower-cost brands or retailers when shopping a standard basket of goods.
Consumers are likely to keep the behaviors they’ve adopted amid stay-at-home orders, such as more online shopping and fewer mall visits.
(“Survey: US consumer sentiment during the coronavirus crisis,” McKinsey & Company, October 20, 2020) (“The Pandemic Is Rewriting the Rules of Retail,” Harvard Business Review, July 06, 2020)
Given the current state of the world, the industry environment and the anxieties currently experienced by shoppers worldwide, how can we position Nordstrom’s redesign to deliver a mobile-first experience that will meet customer needs?
We will deliver a streamlined shopping experience, reducing the number of critical decisions required by the customer to successfully complete a purchase. We will seek to simplify product exploration by reconsidering and deconstructing the site architecture, simplifying the navigation wayfinding experience and reducing the amount of content wherever possible to deliver a lighter (and cleaner) mobile experience.
The Competition
A competitive audit provides an overview of the competition that allows for the direct comparison and analysis of web experiences in the category to produce insights that will help inform the redesign. During this time, we should observe general functionality, both standard and unique to the respective brand site, product categorization, content hierarchy, etc. and discuss its impact on the overall user experience.
Preliminary scope definition
We have been tasked with executing a redesign of the Nordstrom eCommerce website
Redesign is limited to front end only and will not include any back end considerations. Redesign will be built on existing CMS platform. No systems migrations necessary.
Client will provide all digital assets required to support the redesign, including all product imagery, videos, animations, etc.
Scope includes full eCommerce website including Homepage, Category pages, Product pages, Service pages, Sign in and Account pages and page/site features such as add to cart, ratings and reviews, search, product filtering, SKU and product feature variations, offer tool, etc. according to product roadmap
Product roadmaps
Product roadmaps are a way to provide a quick overview of the development of any given product and its associated timeline. Roadmaps are defined by weighing any number of business, user and budget requirements, aligning with key stakeholders along the way to re-prioritize and refine as necessary. For the purposes of this case study, a general raodmap was developed with features included as FPO for reference only.
Define the features
Defining the product roadmap requires a series of inputs, one of which is requirements from the business. Client workshops should be held in the discovery process to clearly define those features that are most important to the business, followed by considerations for features that would be nice to have. Creating a framework around “must-haves”, “should-haves”, and “would-like-to-haves” helps quickly frame the inputs for the MVP.
Establish the roadmap
Leveraging all inputs from the business, the user and by weighing the total level of effort, we can begin creating the roadmap for our product, clearly defining those features required across any number of total sprints to drive towards the MVP, or initial release. Lower priority features should be placed in the backlog and elevated as time allows and user demand requires.
Design and development process
What follows is a general overview of the web process and the high-level steps required to drive to product launch. Depending on specific project requirements and scope, steps may be added/removed. This may impact product delivery.
At the start of the project, it is important that we clarify the product request via the web brief. It is here where the ask is defined. All relevant project information is included including marketing objectives, business considerations, important milestones, localization requirements, etc.
All requirements must be received by the deadlines indicated in the WBS. Any delay in receiving project requirements may have an impact on final project delivery. Web client should confirm stakeholder ownership of project requirements and facilitate delivery of those requirements to the WT design team.
Client should define and confirm all stakeholders required for approval at various steps within the design process.
Projects will need to be prioritized via sprint planning and weekly scrums.
Data Analytics + Strategy
How is the site currently performing against our KPIs? All-up performance, engagement (CTR, scroll rate, heatmaps), conversion (e.g. Add to Cart CTR).
Customer pathing analyses; What content are users digesting and interacting with along the user journey? Are there key points in the customer journey where there is significant user drop off?
Strategy + User Experience Design
Content audit, review of the site architecture
What are we seeing from competitors? Are there any trends?
Recommend user test walking prospective buyers through the current web experience. Ask participants to make a purchase or find a product.
Recommend treejack and card-sorting user study exercises to better understand product grouping to define and up-level product categories; direct impact on site navigation and the MVP requirement for category and product pages.
Site survey to better understand our customers, provides an opportunity to better define personas and user groups and possible optimization opportunities in the future.
Development
What framework are we using? What CMS are we using? Are we leveraging the existing? What are the requirements?
What technology stack do we have available? What might we need in the future? What opportunities do we have to optimize future releases?
Program considerations
What is the MVP and does the deliverable meet that standard? Have we accounted for all of the requirements in the discovery, planning and execution phases? How are we managing our stakeholders? Do we have the budget to deliver the project? Do we have the resources to support our roadmap?
Project roadmap + delivery
Sprint planning is a necessary component of project delivery, ensuring that your teams are focused on the most immediate and high impact projects as determined by the product roadmap. I developed a sprint plan document that calculates the LOE for each project, defining time commitments by various project team members and providing an overview of team capacity to help manage the team’s time.
Budgeting and Resourcing
Budgets should reflect the total level of effort required to deliver the project/program. Actuals should be combined with budget projections to forecast burn and ensure the project remains under budget.
The recommendation
A formal recommendation is contingent upon confirmation and delivery of various business and user input requirements, however the Nordstrom website should be redesigned using a mobile-first approach. The current experience is both heavy with content and difficult to navigate. With extensive product categories, the navigation suffers, producing a confusing (and overwhelming) way-finding experience that may be frustrating for both desktop and mobile users. Navigation should simplified and critical decision points along the path to purchase should be reduced to limit the number of clicks required. Page length should be shortened, with the content of most interest to the user prioritized near the top of the page. Possible targeting/personalization opportunities as audience segments become more defined.