HOW A NEW WEBSITE DESIGN DOUBLED SALES

Transcription

1 HOW A NEW WEBSITE DESIGN DOUBLED SALES FOR GIFTBASKET.COM A CLIENT SUCCESS STORY FROM ZEN DESIGN FIRM FEATURING Giftbasket.com Zen Design Firm, LLC sales@giftbasket.com 510 S. Main St Old Forge, PA Web Design & Internet Marketing Firm info@zendesignfirm.com

2 PROLOGUE This case study features Giftbasket.com, a Zen Design Firm client. It demonstrates how Zen Design Firm, a web design and internet marketing company, works with clients like Giftbasket.com, a leading e-commerce website, to provide effective web design services that make websites more attractive and get more sales. Many businesses often overlook the value an attractive, functional website design offers their customers. Our experience shows having an engaging web design captures visitor s attention immediately, making it much more likely they ll stay on your website long enough for you to convince them to buy. Because businesses only need to update their website every three years, while performing minor maintenance tasks during that time, it makes no sense for them to have a web designer on staff. That s where our knowledge and experience comes in. Joe Riviello, President Zen Design Firm

3 PART I: GIFTBASKET.COM & ZEN DESIGN FIRM COMPANY BACKGROUNDS GIFTBASKET.COM Giftbasket.com was founded in 1998 with the mission of Helping customers find the perfect gift for any family member, friend, or loved one on any budget. Richard Gabriel, entrepreneur, owns and operates the company. He has been involved with a couple blockbuster domain name deals. Gabriel has sold Dropshippers.com for $1.5 million and Auction.com for $1.7 million. ZEN DESIGN FIRM Founded in 2007 by Joe Riviello, Zen Design Firm has morphed from a company singularly focused on web design solutions for businesses to a complete internet marketing solutions provider. Zen Design Firm s mission is to deliver the very best design service with effective, measurable results.

4 PART II: PROCESS Richard Gabriel approached us after learning about our web design services online. Sales came in at about a rate of 100 gift baskets per day, but Richard knew an improved web design could help grow his business. In response to his request, we sent him our internal portfolio which instantly made a significant impression. As soon as I looked over Zen s portfolio, I knew they could do what I envisioned, said Gabriel. Once Richard knew we were the right company to work with, we took him through our 5-step process: INVESTIGATION AND DISCOVERY, where we learned in-depth about his business and goals PLANNING AND PREPARATION, which is when design concepts and wireframes are created VISUALIZATION, which involves clarifying the look and design of the wireframe DESIGN, which includes implementing the overall look of the website DEVELOPMENT, which includes designing the mockup into a fully functioning website The process overall went very smooth only very slight modifications were made to the original proposal. CHANGES MADE The old website looked like this:

5 With this being the final product created: The most significant changes we made and why:

6 USED NEARLY THE FULL SCREEN WIDTH The old version of the website left lots of space unused. Users want websites that consume almost all available space especially mobile and tablet PC users who navigate with their fingers. MADE MULTIPLE USABILITY ENHANCEMENTS We added a search function (visible at top right), categorized all items/products, allowed users to sort by various options (price, ascending/descending alphabetical order, customer rating, quick shipping, and best-selling), as well as featured/popular gift basket sections on the home page. In today s e-commerce market, web shoppers see these options as essential, not optional. ALLOWED PURCHASING FROM GOOGLE CHROME For whatever reason, we couldn t do it on the old site, but we added that ability with the new one. GAVE WORLD SHIP UPS CONFIGURATION For high volume businesses, this feature integrates directly into the website so shipping labels for gift cards and new orders are printed with the click of a single button at the end of the day. In the past, employees performed this cumbersome process manually for each package shipped. CUSTOMERS CAN NOW STORE ORDERS If they re not ready to order now, products sit in their cart until they are ready.

7 PART III: RESULTS After implementing all design recommendations, Giftbasket.com experienced the following results: THE SITE LOADS FASTER Even though the past design was relatively simple, it loaded slower than the newer, more complex design. Depending on what set of statistics you believe, somewhere around 40% of people leave a website that takes longer than 3 seconds to load. PEOPLE NOW FIND THE WEBSITE THROUGH THE SEARCH ENGINES Even though the company has a very search-friendly domain name in Giftbasket.com, people weren t finding the website through organic search. After the redesign, business now comes through the web. INCREASED CUSTOMER RETENTION RATE The better overall visual experience builds more credibility with website visitors, while enhanced functionality such as the option to store items in a cart for purchase at a later date, provide a much more visitor-friendly experience. Customers now come back to the website for more repeat purchases. STREAMLINED WORK PROCESSES Remember how employees used to print and place shipping labels on each of the 100 packages? Now, those labels are all placed on automatically, saving the company time and money. And the biggest result of all: Before our interaction with Zen Design Firm, we were selling less than 100 gift baskets per day. We don t know the long-term results of the new design, but the immediate results have been stellar. WE NOW SELL MORE THAN 200 GIFT BASKETS PER DAY! -Richard Gabriel, Owner When you design a website with the idea of optimizing the user experience to enhance business outcomes, you get real, concrete results like these.