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Customer experience review: Crutchfield.com
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.)
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See also:
• Customer experience review: Amazon Kindle
• Customer experience review: Redbox.com
Nice article, as we've come to expect :)
Your examination of this site had you stumble upon something I'm sure you've seen before - technobabble... see, there's this problem with people selling stuff that has some sort of technical description to be made of it, which is to say, pretty much anyone not selling beer cozies.
Areas like cars, stereos (and, indeed, car stereos) and computers have gotten non-techie folks all over used to ramming their presumably ignorant heads up against babble walls everywhere - but it's really just a very clear example of what may be the largest communication problem there is: - saying things without caring who it is being said to.
Way too many people with things to say, when speaking in one-way channels such as, oh I don't know, websites, forget to think about (or don't care) if the reader is going to understand anything, focusing on what they, in their state of already knowing it, would like to tell the reader that they know.
You know, really impressive stuff, like incomprehensible facts about the inner workings of plasma screens and car engines, and so on.
A friend of mine, in response to one of my press releases - and to point out the contrast, since mine, if I do say so myself (and since they're in Danish you couldn't call me on it if you wanted to ;), are short, to the point and entertaining to boot (no, really, people have actually said that) - sent me a release about some sort of flat screen TV (I think, it didn't even include a picture, or a link to one).
The document was a whopping three pages in print, filled with truly baffling verbiage and sprinkled generously with abbreviations such as VDXT-1000dr, MPEG4 and what have we - even trying, I didn't understand any of it.
And this was meant to get my friend, who is a journalist, to write about the product in her magazine - how do you not think of the fact that, in order to do what you'd like them to do, people have to understand what you're telling them...?
Sizable rant (bet nobody believes "short and to the point" by now ;), but really, website design, like most design, is all about communication, right?
Great article that is too true. I agree with you that Crutchfield stands the test of time and is a consistent innovator. They arent the cheapest, but they have the most information, best photos, etc. Still, your points are 100% accurate, they are too close to their business and arent taking a "glazed and confused" look at their site. If they did, they would realize what you say. Even though its pretty, doesn't mean people can digest it.
Fight the good fight.
Bryan
Jesper - good point - consumer electronics seem especially to be like this. Apple is a good counterpoint - compare the name "Mac Mini" to "XPS M1330" (a Dell computer).
Bryan - thanks - I agree, glazed and confused - just muddling through - is a good way to evaluate a site more accurately!
Mark, good review and I agree with you about Crutchfield's reputation for quality sales and service. One exception to what you said about siloing (if indeed, that's a word). For me, learning is very different than buying and it only confuses the academic experience if there are sales pitches on the page. Terms like "moderately priced" or "big budget" are sufficient to let me know that I may need to be looking at the trade-offs I need to accept to get into my price range. If a tuner had excellent discrimination between frequencies, options such as whether it is available in tan or black is not really germain to the technical discussion, and that information should be on the same page as cost and availability. The "glazed and confused" comment from Bryan is spot on and more sites with technical info should review using that approach. Keep up the good work, Mark.
Scott
I'm a recovering audiophile who put together a mid to high end sound system in the years B.K. (Before Kids). I used to treat the Crutchfield catalog like holy scriptures. Recently, I wanted to replace an older receiver that's overheating and is excessively noisy. I went to Crutchfield.com - and quickly left for all the reasons you cited.
Regarding chat sessions - only Dell (of all companies!) got it right for me. After a recent RMA session, while I was trying to copy/paste the text before it disappeared, I received the chat transcript in my inbox! Instantly, in full, the moment the chat ended. Very nice!
Great Writeup! I've used crutchfield for a number of home theater purchases, and have always been happy with their service.
I have to agree with you to some extent regarding the simplification of the site. While I think it's great that they're offering a boatload of info on every single product they're offering, it might be a bit better to perhaps offer an overview first, and then delve into the real nitty gritty, should the shopper so choose.
I like the non-silo approach as well. Amazon has championed this approach (If you liked this...you might also like...) and I could see it working quite well for Crutchfield. If I'm shopping for a bluray player, I might also need an optical cable or an HDMI cable, but I might also be interested in upgrading that 5 year old receiver to take advantage of my new bluray player. The way I see it now, that's going to have to require navigating my way over to an entirely different section of the site. It should be right in front of me.
Good advice on how to fix there shop. Is this why the now have taken it down and put in an Access Denied on the webserver??? A bit to much simplified isn't it?
The main problem is most of the time the abillity of not beeing able to choose. If you want a webshop, then let your website be a webshop. Make your navigation clear and simple and tell people what to expect when they choose to follow that path.
All the stuff you describe on the homepage which unfortunatily currently I can't see. Sounds like an over actively marketing department which can't focus.
Good work Mark and Keep it up ;)
Mark,
I did take a gander at the site and it seems pretty much like any other electronics site I've been to. I didn't think it was too hard to understand the different area of the website. I think they might have updated the site to be more user friendly? While I do agree that you should be able to find information about the products you are interested in on the site, I don't think there is any substitution for an actual person. I never fully understood how you can promote a business based on customer service without having that aspect available to it's full potential.