Archives / October 2008

NYT: "For all that has been written about Hulu's easy-to-use, aesthetically pleasing interface, the advertising experience is equally important." (Fewer ads, viewer ratings of ads, minigames during breaks)

If you're reading this via RSS, you might have missed these recent job posts on our Jobs Board:

• The US Tennis Association seeks a database manager. (NY)

• Gist Design is looking for a UI designer. (PA)

• TheLadders is hiring an online copywriter. (NY)

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The paperless office is getting closer:

Older people still prefer a hard copy of most things, but younger workers are increasingly comfortable reading on screens and storing and retrieving information on computers or online. As a result, International Paper has closed five uncoated-freesheet mills in America in the past decade, and the industry is consolidating. IP is investing instead in poor countries, where demand is still growing.

Paper usage will remain strong, The Economist notes, on high-end jobs - where paper still beats screens in the tactile experience, and where a physical artifact is meaningful or valuable.

New research on academic publishing: the papers most likely to be published in academic journals are those that cover "hot" topics or make sensationalist claims. The only problem is that those popular papers tend to be inaccurate. Says the Economist, "the 'hotter' the field, the greater the competition is and the more likely it is that published research in top journals could be wrong."

So: if you want accuracy in your scientific papers (generally a good thing to shoot for), look for the papers that take a balanced approach - address something that's not trendy in the moment - don't make sensationalist claims - and generally aren't on the front cover of the journal. Score one for the hedgehogs.

I remember reading an interview of Simpsons creator Matt Groening a few years back where he was asked the secret to becoming a good cartoonist.

His answer was something like "Draw, draw, draw, draw, and draw some more." Drawing his early comic strip characters - at school, at home, in class, on break, any time and all the time - a bazillion times had taught him how to draw those characters. Experience itself was the teacher.

That's instructive for anyone who's interested in the online customer experience. Use this website, that website, and the one over there. Click, click, click, click, click, try this, demo that, engross yourself in every online interface you can find. Pretty soon you'll see the patterns that govern the successes and failures.

Obviously, it helps if you love digital interfaces. I've been hooked since age 5 when I saw my first computer (see Bit Literacy), so it's the air I breathe. If you need a work or school assignment to force you to check this stuff out, well hmm.

One good way to try lots of interfaces, by the way, is to spend some time on Good Experience Games. Hundreds of clever and unique UIs ready to try out, right now.

Responding to a request from the Crutchfield.com team, here's my customer experience review.

Context

Crutchfield has long been known as a customer-centered retailer of electronics, especially for home and car stereos. In an industry otherwise known for complicated products, confusing terminology and sometimes shady practices, Crutchfield has built a loyal base of customers who appreciate its great customer service and high-quality products. (No wonder Crutchfield was a Copernican award nominee.)

The Crutchfield.com website, then, has a tall order: deliver great customer service, clear explanations, and an easy shopping process to customers accustomed to Crutchfield's good offline experience.

Hook

My conclusion: the Crutchfield.com experience excels in some ways, notably its emphasis on learning content - but there is still a good deal of room for improvement throughout the site.

Explanation

I actually am in the market for a basic home audio system, as my 18-year-old Panasonic boom box sadly doesn't seem to want to live another two decades. (Strangely, it's actually the same stereo you can see on Michael Scott's desk in "The Office.")

So my genuine, user-generated task is to research my options for a replacement: I need something at least for AM/FM radio and CDs - and as I'm not a raving audiophile I just want to keep it simple.

As I type "crutchfield.com" in the address bar of my browser, I'm expecting to see a homepage that emphasizes Crutchfield's trademark customer service and walkthroughs of complicated buying decisions.

When the page loads, a quick scan provides a much different experience. Here's the prominent text I see in my scan:

FREE TV stand
Meet our You dream it, Tailgate dreams
FREE installation
FREE shipping
Save up to $100 on select
Big savings & free shipping
Save $100 on this Sony
Special financing

It all feels a little "Crazy Eddie" to me, which is anything but what Crutchfield really is. Instead of "free free free, save save save," I would have expected "let us help you." I understand the value of homepage promotions, but the current design overpowers the experience.

Changing my focus to the tabs on top of the homepage, I'm brought up short by the tabs Shop and Learn. Wait a minute. Why are these two different areas of the site? Can't I learn about products during the shopping process (and vice-versa)? What am I giving up by choosing one tab over the other?

Since I'm early in my decision process, I click Learn, and am taken to a kind of site-map list of links, where I click "Receivers, Amps & Tuners" - making a mental note to find out the difference between a receiver and a tuner.

Unfortunately, the page I arrive on makes no mention of tuners. None. So I'm not sure if (a) Crutchfield doesn't sell tuners, or (b) there's simply nothing to learn about them.

Clicking into Receivers, I arrive on a page with 18 different articles - in no particular order, with no apparent organization - with titles like "Understanding Surround Sound Formats." Much of the content appears to be written for audiophiles who are here to learn about DTS-ES's 6.1 sound channels or the tradeoffs of a 100-watt RMS. I suddenly wonder if I even belong here - maybe this isn't for the uninformed like me - and then catch myself: this is exactly the reaction I see in listening labs, when customers blame themselves for the needless complexity of the technology.

Through a FAQ I find in this section, I spot a link to the "Receivers, Amps & Tuners" page - and click it, thereby crossing over into the Shop section of the site. On the bottom of the page, the 20th product listed, is a single tuner, the Sangean HDT-1 for $200. I'm still unsure if this is the right path, or the right product to start with, but I click anyway.

Now on the product page, I scroll down (past a needlessly large photo that dominates valuable vertical space) to view the product details, and there sitting prominently by itself, in large text, is the price: $250. Wait a minute: the price was $200 on the previous page. Did the price just jump 25%?

Actually, no - the Sangean HDT-1 is $200, while the Sangean HDT-1X is $250. Clear enough? The price in the main column is an upsell to a fancier device with a nearly identical name, while the price of the actual product on this page is in the upper-left - an unusual place to put a price, which is why I missed it at first.

At this point it's clear that I need help, so I click "Live online chat" at the top of the page. This is a feature that I've never seen work well, on any retailer's site, so I'm pleasantly surprised when Troy arrives, quickly, and begins delivering helpful, informed answers to my several questions. He even sends me to some recommended speakers for the Sangean tuner. The session ends abruptly, though, when Troy leaves the room and all the text - including his helpful explanations - disappears with no warning. (Update: Turns out the transcript was mailed to my address - a backup address that I don't check often, which I chose - and then didn't check - because there was no messaging on the Crutchfield site that I would get the transcript afterward.)

I end my time on Crutchfield.com with a better sense of what's available, and what I may want to buy, for my home audio project. But most of what I know, I learned from live chat. I wish that the site was simpler and more focused, so I wouldn't have to rely on customer service reps in the future.

Recommendation

Here's my proposed strategy for a Crutchfield.com redesign: simplify, simplify, simplify. (Actually, just make that one "simplify".)

The site is a bit like a high-tech stereo receiver: it has tons of features, and useful ones at that, but no easy way of getting through them. Crutchfield has invested heavily in explaining the complicated world of electronics, but the accumulated information on the site is difficult, at best, for a non-audiophile to navigate and digest.

I admit that I don't fit the profile for much of their customer base. I'll never configure a custom stereo system for my car - heck, I don't even own a car! - and most of my audio streams into my Mac from the Internet, through some cheap desktop speakers. But even stereo neophytes occasionally make a big purchase, and for them Crutchfield.com has the opportunity to create a better experience. The company certainly has a great reputation with customers who have bought from it.

Lessons

Some takeaways to improve the customer experience:

• Don't overdo promotions on the homepage. Instead, focus the homepage on features and content that explain the purpose and value of using the website.

• Don't silo your content into competing areas of the site. Customers researching a product want all of the information available from one page or section.

• Name links accurately. If a link says "Tuners," make sure it points to a page with tuner information.

• Upsell carefully. Be sure that the upsell doesn't appear too similar to the product that the customer is researching.

• Keep live chat active even when the session ends. Don't delete the entire session's text without the customer's permission.

• Keep the site simple, in order to minimize operating costs for call centers.

(If you're interested in improving your company's customer experience, get in touch with me or my team at Creative Good.)

- - -

See also:

• Customer experience review: Amazon Kindle

• Customer experience review: Redbox.com

Got a customer experience problem? Choose where to invest: fixing the user experience, or advertising to bring more people into the problematic experience.

No joke, some companies still don't know the right answer. As I wrote in Budgeting for Advertising and the Customer Experience, some CEOs still would rather throw tens of millions of bucks at the problem with ads.

So I really enjoyed Apple's take:

Yes, I know it's ironic that we're watching this message in the form of an ad. Still.

(Thanks to Scott for the pointer!)

Media diet day! Three must-listen podcasts:

• Fresh Air: interview of ex-CIA operative Robert Baer, author of The Devil We Know - who says on the show, and I quote, "of course Bin Laden is dead" - and points out why Iran is actually helping us in Iraq.

• This American Life: profile of Geoffrey Canada and the Harlem Children's Zone. As author Paul Tough writes in Whatever It Takes and says in this interview, there is a solution to poverty. And it's not that complicated. It just requires people deciding to do it. (See also this past pointer to Canada on Fresh Air.)

• This American Life: Another Frightening Show About the Economy, a followup to their recent, very popular Giant Pool of Money episode, explaining the credit crisis in clear language (which everyone should take time to hear).

P.S. If you're interested in creating a media diet for yourself, start by reading Bit Literacy.

Update: Bonus fourth item, Charlie Rose's interview of Warren Buffett on the financial crisis:

A few weeks ago I wrote The JetBlue experience, sliding, making the point that this once-beloved airline appears to be intentionally dismantling its customer-centered culture.

Twenty of you wrote in with comments, mostly agreeing with the column, and even offering a counterexample of Southwest Airlines, which has maintained its customer focus.

Now the New York Times has run a profile of JetBlue, pointing to evidence that JetBlue's management is actively moving away from its original vision:

Though its approach is still jaunty, as seen in its "Happy Jetting" slogan, JetBlue is reshaping itself. Notably, it has shifted from its roots as a low-fare carrier and adopted a sober and more nebulous identity as "a value airline."

Some analysts have voiced concerns that this might not be the best strategic move; here's the reply, an instant classic:

Edward Barnes, JetBlue's chief financial officer, says the airline isn't worried. "You can't underestimate the brand," he said.

You can't underestimate the brand. It raises an obvious question: What brand?

Let's compare: the old JetBlue had...

• low fares
• on-time, friendly service
• pillows and blankets upon request
• and an overall experience that customers recommended to their friends

...and the new JetBlue has...

• ads and signs everywhere saying "Happy Jetting"
• higher fares
• some of the poorest on-time arrival measurements in the industry
• pillows and blankets for $7
• and an overall experience that I've personally seen customers recommend their friends against, multiple times, over several months.

If one is to measure the brand by the traditional approach ("let's spend thirty million dollars shoving a logo and a tag line down their throats"), then the new JetBlue is, I suppose, consistent and well-known. Lots of money buys lots of ad impressions. Congratulations.

However, if one is to measure the brand through the lens of "good experience," which I believe is the most accurate way of evaluating companies today, then JetBlue is doing poorly.

Branding is simple. It doesn't take two years in an MBA program, or a PhD in quantitative analysis, to understand one simple fact. As I wrote about in Defining "Branding",...

The brand is what you tell your friends about afterwards.

If your JetBlue flight leaves you feeling annoyed enough to tell your friends about the experience, no amount of "Happy Jetting" happytalk is going to convince your friends otherwise.

Similarly, if your experience with Google - or Apple - or Whole Foods - or Southwest Airlines - or any other beloved product or service - leaves you raving about how great it was, then the company by definition has a strong brand.

The winning companies today are those that listen to their customers, and create products and services that serve customers' needs with speed, service, and low cost... in other words, the winners are those with the best customer experience.

As the financial markets continue to tighten competition for customers, this equation will become even more important. Dropping thirty million to shout a tag line at customers, rather than building a customer-centric culture, is now even more dangerous than it was in the past.

And so I actually agree with JetBlue's CFO: you really can't underestimate the brand. I just wonder whether he understands what the brand actually is.

- - -

When Ed Barnes says "you can't underestimate the brand," I think he means what he says: that no matter how low you estimate the brand, it's never an underestimation.

One could say: you must not underestimate the brand. That makes good sense (in the spirit in which you and I would invoke that phrase).

Or one could say: you can't overestimate the brand, meaning that no matter how high you estimate the brand, it's never too much - that's how important it is. Again, this aligns with our point of view.

If my analysis here holds water, then Barnes is indeed telling us what he truly thinks, and it explains perfectly well what's going on. We just keep hearing something else, because it seems so hard to believe. Then again, maybe he's telling us the truth without even noticing it himself.

Finalists in the competition to redesign New York City's bike racks. Also on the streets are some bike racks designed by David Byrne. I love living in this city.

Multitasking debunked on NPR: "People can't multitask very well, and when people say they can, they're deluding themselves," said neuroscientist Earl Miller. And, he said, "The brain is very good at deluding itself."

Meanwhile it appears that the recent commuter train crash in Los Angeles was caused by the train operator, who was sending text messages instead of watching traffic signals.

If you know someone who needs an intervention, hand them Bit Literacy.

As information increases exponentially, clear writing becomes ever more valuable. To paraphrase the "Creating Bits" chapter in Bit Literacy, good writing states its point upfront and quickly, and then ends as soon as possible.

From the Plain English Campaign come these examples of clarifying writing:

Before
High-quality learning environments are a necessary precondition for facilitation and enhancement of the ongoing learning process.

After
Children need good schools if they are to learn properly.

Before
If there are any points on which you require explanation or further particulars we shall be glad to furnish such additional details as may be required by telephone.

After
If you have any questions, please phone.

More fun reading on their examples page.