Guest post by John W. Kolker, Web Analytics Technical Consultant, Siteworx —
Your organization already has an advanced web presence. It has been tested and there is not a single functionality error. Everything works perfectly and nothing is broken. So why then are you not getting the conversions you want on sales, registrations, subscriptions or any other process you want your digital audience to complete?
The answer is very simple: struggle. Struggle in a digital context can be defined as: The tendency for a digital user/visitor to flounder or otherwise get lost or confused on your site or application and, as a result, to be unable to fully complete a process.
With Tealeaf, struggle is measurable. It used to be that the only way we knew something was "wrong" with a website or application was by tracking errors. Errors certainly influence customer behavior as they react to the erroneous processes, but it is only one part of what makes up a struggle.
Your organization already has an advanced web presence. It has been tested and there is not a single functionality error. Everything works perfectly and nothing is broken. So why then are you not getting the conversions you want on sales, registrations, subscriptions or any other process you want your digital audience to complete?
The answer is very simple: struggle. Struggle in a digital context can be defined as: The tendency for a digital user/visitor to flounder or otherwise get lost or confused on your site or application and, as a result, to be unable to fully complete a process.
With Tealeaf, struggle is measurable. It used to be that the only way we knew something was "wrong" with a website or application was by tracking errors. Errors certainly influence customer behavior as they react to the erroneous processes, but it is only one part of what makes up a struggle.
Types of Struggle:
Confusion by Design
This is struggle caused by poorly thought-out design. Remember that, just like in the real world, the digital masses are going to behave like water and take the path of least resistance to get where they want to go. The logical path to shepherd your visitors should be straightforward and the most obvious.
Digital ADD
Overwhelming your visitors with too many choices, too many forks in the road and too many distractions is a sure way to impose digital thrashing and a struggle that resembles a form of Digital Attention Deficit Disorder. Make the path clean and uncluttered. If your goal is to have a visitor add something to his cart, whip out his credit card and make a payment, then once an item is in the cart there should only be one primary path without other navigation options and links. Of course, if you goal is to also cross-sell or up-sell, then other paths should also be added.
Dead-Ending
This type of struggle usually occurs at the end of a path down which you wanted your visitor to proceed. A common example of this is site search results that return zero matches. Many times, content on the response page is very generic and can be something like, "Query returned no results, please modify criteria."
So, now the visitor is asking himself, "Really? So, hmmm, you didn’t find what I was looking for, so now what?" Essentially, you have dead-ended the visitor. A simple content adjustment and perhaps a "continue" or "search again" button may do the trick to take him out of this situation. Tealeaf can help you identify this type of struggle and help you remove dead-ends that trap your visitors and prevent them from being successful.
Demanding Too Much
Also known as the "Are you kidding me!?" struggle.
Let's say your visitor wants to buy a light bulb on your e-commerce site. He starts shopping and find the bulb he wants. Then, he adds it to his cart. So far, so good—but then he has to register because your site doesn't offer guest checkout. Your registration process is five steps long and now he has to wait for an email to get the link to confirm their registration and then click "continue" to login. All he wanted to do was buy the #$%! light bulb. At this point, the visitor may be thinking: "Are you kidding me?" Struggle like this should be a thing of the past, but the surprise is that it still exists on many e-commerce sites. Tealeaf can be used to track this type of struggle and, as you simplify the process, help you quantify how the struggle goes down and the conversions go up.
Why is measuring and resolving struggle so important? The answer is very simple:
Tealeaf is invaluable in tracking the customer experience and providing valuable insights into brand experience. Brand experience can be understood as the measurable sentiment garnered from visual, verbal and experiential encounters with the brand. The brand experience encompasses a range of intellectual, sensory and emotional connections. In other words, anytime someone touches your company (print, email, Web, social media, brick-and-mortar, etc.) they are experiencing your brand—whether it is good, neutral, or bad. And that experience will stay with them...for some time.
In part two of this blog post, I will discuss in detail how to conduct an unstructured analysis of the various types of struggles so a user can understand what causes it and, more importantly, how Tealeaf can be used to resolve those struggles.
Siteworx, a leading interactive agency and Web content management (WCM) consultancy, helps interactive marketers, Web strategists and technology leaders achieve measurable business results.
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