UX Planet — Medium | Virginie Nesa

Once I was interviewed for a role at Cosmoparis, a french leather and footwear brand, and as a test I had to suggest new features that would improve their website. Finally I worked for another fashion company, but I recently found again this document on my laptop and I was curious to see how this website has grown since.

1/ Reflexion

Cosmoparis has started a rebranding few years ago, to stand out from competitors and having a more trendy image.

Cosmoparis, like other retailers has to face important challenges since digital has taken an important part on our daily life. Today, retailers must create complete experiences to their customers by offering multi-channel services. They have to answer new customers needs and behaviour such as ROPO (research on-line and purchase off-line), while ensuring that their distribution channels do not cannibalize each other.

2/ Emphasize

Personas

To better understand the final user, I decide to work on persona profiles. So I started with this provisional one, based on my assumptions and online researches I made about the brand and its customers.

User journey

In order to have deeper knowledge of the user, I created a user journey focused on a multi-channel purchase experience. This exercise helped me to explore customer’s motivation and behaviour and allowed me to progress in my research and design work.

Imaginary user journey

3/ Define

I focused my work on the Cosmoparis’ detailed product page because this is an important page in the user’s online purchase journey and it allowed me to explore how the brand deals with the multi-channel sales too.

Currently, the website is crossing digital and physical shops in a complementary way with “click and reserve” and “click and pick up” features. They offer a free exchange and return policy in their own shops too. These features are interesting and show that the brand has already introduced multi-channel sales into its strategy. But during my research, I identified some usability problems I encountered during my online purchase journey.

Define usability problems

User pain points board

I gathered and prioritized the pain points together under three main categories : highlighting the product, delivery and return, additional products.

• Highlighting the product :

The detailed product page displays too much information for the user. The main content is hidden under several texts and buttons, for example, the description text, is difficult to read.

I was surprised to see the menu on the left on this page. It takes an important place which could have been used to organize the product information in another way. Besides, the user can use the previous/next navigation, the breadcrumb and the header’s menu to navigate since the current page.

The color’s select box is not enough understandable, especially when you are buying a pattern fabric shoes.

Unfortunately there is no navigation within the product images. Besides, when I clicked on one to zoom-in, I was disturbed to see the zoom on the left side hiding the others information.

• Additional products :

I don’t know the click-through rate on these products but as a user I found it not attractive and it was unfortunate to be unable to access further information. In addition I was surprised to find my current product in this category.

• Delivery and return :

The delivery and returns area is not easy to reach, the user has to scroll down and click on the title to access at these information.

Currently the e-reservation journey is completely separate from the classic purchase journey but and it’s really confusing for the user. For exemple, when I made a size and color selection and the click on the e-reservation button, a pop-up appears with four steps to complete. But the thing is I have to select again a size, color, city and shop because the system didn’t register my previous information.

Moreover, on every steps, whether at the size and color selection or or for the city and shops choices, the user is never sure about the product availabilities. Sometimes, it takes me many times to enter these information and at the last step I’ve been informed that the shop I chose didn’t offers e-reservation service.

4/ Prototype

I focused my proposition on the delivery and return usability problem because it appears as the most painful one for the user. However, when I worked on the product page I tried to improve a bit the product information and the complementary offers too.

I did two design mock-up, one for the product detailed page and the other for the click and collect checkout. Let’s start with the product page.

Product detailed page

I changed the page architecture by deleting the left menu and place all the textual information on the right side. The product now takes more space and the user can clearly identify its details and call to actions.

I moved the “reservation in a shop” under an action I called “Click and collect” because this is a common term the user understands better. A click on this link will expand the delivery and returns policies’. I made an effort to simplify them too.

I incorporated the e-reservation in the purchase journey, the user will have the same journey when he will reserve or buy articles.

That brings us to the click and collect checkout page :

Click and collect checkout page

At this point, the user has already confirmed his basket and registered with his personal details. He can now choose a delivery mode between the click and collect (old “reservation in a shop”) and standard delivery.

the click and collect journey starts by choosing a shop. To do that, the user has to enter an address or be geo-localized to see the list of shops around his location. The user can see a variety of information about the shop such as the address, opening hours and the item’s availability.

Then, when he has selected a shop, he can choose a collection date. This way, he is no longer forced to deal with the schedule imposed by the store.

As a product owner, I think that case studies are a good exercise to improve my skills. It allows me to stay focused on the user when I think about new features for a product. Cosmoparis online booking service is a good improvement for a fashion retailer and by using common terms and a streamlined purchase journey, the user experience would be even more attractive.

Thanks for reading me!

Click and collect : Usability case study was originally published in UX Planet on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.