Client Background
Transend.us is a B2B ecommerce platform launched by Transtar Industries Inc., which enables visitors (primarily working in the car repair industry) to find matching auto parts for complex vehicle repairs (e.g. transmission rebuilds, drive chain, etc) for a vehicle using license plate number, VIN, or year-make-model-engine type. Transtar Industries with the Transend.us platform operate under the umbrella of Transtar Holdings Company, a family of brands that are leaders in the automotive industry.
The Challenge
The client approached Experiment Zone to provide an objective and expert outside perspective on the user experience (UX) of the Transend.us website, so that the Transtar team could have a baseline to compare the performance for prospective customers of the current website against a future redesigned site. The findings of the audit would also help signal key friction points and opportunities for improvement that could be incorporated into the new site redesign.
The audit used 600+ criteria created by the Baymard Institute, so that we could provide a baseline website score that could be compared to other industry leaders and the future redesigned site. Additionally, we wanted to uncover and prioritize opportunities that would increase order conversions & improve the user experience, growing the value of the website for the business.
In addition to conducting the Baymard Institute UX Audit, our team analyzed the top opportunities and prioritized key areas of focus for the new site via an expert review delivered in an Executive Summary.
The additional expert review and Executive Summary focused on the perspective that the Transend.us specific audience and their B2B ecommerce experience needed to be analyzed not only by the standard metrics via Baymard, but also by using additional expert review techniques to ensure we were accounting for this unique audience / use case.
Our Strategy
The Experiment Zone team used the Baymard Institute interface to assess and rate the more than 600 criteria specific to ecommerce websites, and layered in a cognitive walkthrough technique that allowed us to assess the interface from a new user’s point of view whose characteristics were aligned with those of the target user persona for the Transend.us website.
This meant that we evaluated the different user flows and pages using the Baymard Institute criteria, and also used our expertise to exclude the criteria that were not applicable to the business or use case.
While the Baymard Institute criteria assessment can be conducted directly by ecommerce teams, the Experiment Zone’s team of expert and objective user experience researchers provided higher impact recommendations based on the most relevant criteria for the user flows specific to the Transend.us website and focused our recommendations on those criteria for a simplified roadmap that our client could apply directly in their workflow for the new website redesign.
Empathizing with the user persona also allowed us to focus our recommendations on their specific needs for search and filter, add to cart, and checkout flows.
The Results
Through the detailed analysis of the Transend website, we identified opportunities for improvement specific to a B2B ecommerce website, as well as best practice changes to make sure the new website will hit the ground running.
- The existing website was scored to create a baseline for future reference when comparing against the redesigned website.
- A list of prioritized & personalized recommendations was provided to make it easier for the client to focus on the key changes that would generate the highest impact for user needs and conversion rates.
- The current score of the website was placed in the context of its competitors to gain a clear understanding of how they compare to other B2B and B2C websites.
- Additionally, we provided a list of recommendations for low lift / high impact A/B tests for the upcoming website, to serve as the foundation for a testing strategy roadmap.