How 1-800-Contacts Could Focus its Home Page

Yesterday we talked about value propositions that answer the question: “why should I buy from you rather than from anybody else?”

As promised, we’re going to look closer at the practical application of a clear value statement and to achieve “congruence” (every element on your landing page either expresses or supports the value proposition).

Our example is 1-800-Contacts:

Note: This is an above-the-fold shot, and doesn’t show the additional graphics and text below the fold that I refer to in the next section.

Crafting the Value Proposition

If you scour the home page text you will find pieces of value propositions like free shipping, 24/7 live customer service, the price guarantee and the claim of the largest inventory of contact lenses online.

I particularly like the statement: “We maintain the world’s largest inventory of contact lenses-almost 10 million. No one is more likely to have your contact lens brand in stock and ready to ship.” It’s a very bold differentiation.

Tony Valcarcel, a member of the Marketing Experiments experts team, suggests combining this statement with the price guarantee to make a solid unique value proposition:

“With the world’s largest inventory of contact lenses, no one is more likely to have your contact lens brand in stock and ready to ship today. If you find your lenses for less anywhere else online, we’ll beat that price by 2%, guaranteed.”

Note, Tony recommends making the word guarantee clickable, hyperlinking to the guarantee’s details. I’ll add that the link should bring up a pop-up so the customer may remain on the home page.

Okay, now that we’ve got a working value proposition, let’s address the design elements on 1-800-Contacts. (I’m going to pretend 1-800-Contacts doesn’t have a competitor is also potentially the world’s largest optical store.)

Eye-flow Matters

The first thing I noticed was the yellow box that reads “We Beat Any Online Price By 2%.” Even though the yellow strip caught my eye immediately, it’s not necessarily the best placement. Says Valcarcel: “This is valuable but its placement to the far right of the page and its banner-esque design means it may not get noticed. Plus, it’s not clear that the badge is clickable.”

We’ll talk about customer motivation next week, but when you think about 1-800-Contacts’ business, the customer is likely to be a hunter (rather than a browser) on a mission to fill a prescription quickly and affordably. Hunters will scan quickly for a link to a specific brand name, a lens type or a search box.

But the thick blue bar containing the search box stops the eye, interrupting the eye-flow like a speed bump. Oof. And the search box is tiny.

Once my eyes have recovered from the hiccup, I get stuck on the graphic header with the customer service representative looking right at me. The Future Now folks explain that a model’s eyes direct your eyes. When the model looks at the call to action, your eyes will follow. If 1-800-Contacts wants me to read the bullet points that support its value proposition like free shipping and 24/7 support, they need to design the page that my eyes are naturally guided there.

Helping Visitors Understand Why to Buy

I actually like the concise bullet points that support the value proposition, but I’d like to see the “Experience the 1-800-Contacts Difference!” replaced with a big search box saying “find your contacts now” to help those ready-to-buy hunters. I’d also replace the image with a woman looking at the bullet points, and test it against a popular product image with a red strikeout price saying “compare to $X” or “List Price: $X Our Price $X.”

Though I like the bullets and short sentences (most won’t read word-for-word on the Web), Valcarcel suggests a more thorough explanation of the value proposition and supporting points:

There are four primary reasons why you should order your contacts from 1-800-Contacts today:

· Name-brand Contacts for Less - We will beat any online price by 2%

· Fast and Free Delivery – Any orders over $50 are shipped to you For FREE

· World’s Largest Inventory – We have over 9.8 million contact lenses for you to choose from

· 24/7 Live Customer Service – Your questions answered by a LIVE representative immediately

Six of our most popular brands are:

(Display images of popular brands)

The idea here is that the value proposition is expressed clearly and the user is told specifically what action to take rather than having to guess.

I would incorporate a powerful testimonial below the 6 images of the brands. At the end of the testimonial I would include a “see what other customers have to say” and have this link pop up with more testimonials.

Which approach is better? Certainly the shorter bullet points could be tested against longer copy to find out.

Helping Visitors Find Products and Understand How to Buy

I believe the navigation is too subtle. If most visitors rely on the main content area rather than navigation for guidance on what to do, it may look like the 6 brands shown are the only option - which doesn’t support the value proposition at all. The images may be assumed as the primary site navigation.

To notice the actual navigation, the visitor has to cognitively abandon the content area and detour to the left side, where the navigation is stacked (making it harder to assimilate options and make a choice). Not to mention the blue text on blue background is not optimal. Believe it or not, milliseconds of thought and effort impact the user experience.

I’d love to see a radical redesign of the content area that is customer-centric and guides the customer to a purchase. Coastal Contacts spells out how to order contact lenses in 3 easy steps:

And, Coastal Contacts’ Refill My Last Order box stands out more than 1-800-Contacts’ tiny link. The repeat order is a major call to action and conversion goal for the home page. 1-800-Contacts is not currently giving it any love.

I also like Coastal Contacts’ Shop by Category in the content area. You can shop by daily, weekly, monthly or colored lenses. Or you can see featured products:

(A pet peeve of mine is “featured products” without an explanation of why they are featured. I prefer to see top sellers, top rated or best deals clarified in the featured section.)

So 1-800-Contacts, you’ve got some homework. Check out your competitors’ sites. Play customer. Do user testing with customers. Figure out how to help people finish the sales process. Then test radical redesigns, with each element stating or supporting your value proposition, and figure out what really works for your business. With any landing page optimization project, testing is the key to knowing what works.



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Posted on December 2nd, 2008 by Linda Bustos
Filed under: Ecommerce

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