Embark Site Navigation Redesign
The Redesign of the navigation for embarkvet.com to create a frictionless customer experience and improve SEO value.
Overview
Embark is a Dog DNA testing company with a mission to improve the life and longevity of dogs through genetic research.
The first step to this mission is to be able to sell as many kits as possible in order to collect the most data, which is where this project came in.
Problem
In order to support the company mission, we needed to increase the number of kits being sold to support company growth and research. We also needed to improve SEO on our site to support this effort.
Goal: Increase conversion by optimizing the site navigation structure and improve SEO value by optimizing the language used in the navigation.
Audience
All potential and existing Embark customers on desktop and mobile web. Both consumer and breeder audiences.
Old Consumer Navigation
Old Breeder Navigation
Research Phase I
Please note that this phase of research was completed by UX Research at Embark. This research is included because it was crucial in informing my designs.
Test Outline
Participants: 10
Goals
Assess the efficacy of current navigation and find areas of improvement to help users find content more easily
Discover pain points, difficult, or vague areas of current navigation
Hypotheses
Users think about our product and information based on different points in the conversion funnel (thinking around individual chapters like high funnel v low funnel)
Users will have a difficult time finding reviews, help, and FAQs
Test
1. Imagine you are interested in DNA testing your dog, you visit a company’s website to learn more. We will ask you to navigate to where you think specific information is located.
2. In the menu, where would you navigate to find what breeds of dog the company screens for? Explain your answer out loud.
3. If you wanted to find what health conditions the company screens for, where would you navigate? Explain your answer out loud.
4. Where would you navigate to find what physical traits the company screens for? Explain your answer out loud.
5. If you wanted to compare the features in the different products, where would you navigate to? Explain your answer out loud.
6. Where would you navigate to sign into the website if you already purchased a kit? Explain your answer out loud.
7. If you were interested in reading this company’s blog, where would you navigate? Explain your answer out loud.
8. If you could wave a magic wand and the sky’s the limit, what would you change, add, or remove from the navigation, how would you organize it? How would you change it? Spend one to two minutes.
Key Findings
Users had choice paralysis surrounding too many similar or vague links are grouped together
Many Users found the supplemental text was helpful when navigating the menu
Many users desire a search feature to search individual breeds & conditions
Users expect Blog, About Us, and Help to remain top level items
FAQ was a term leveraged very frequently by many users (in place of ‘help’)
Recommendations
Change “features” to “what’s included” or “what’s in the kit?”
Investigate Search feature options
Experiment with removing Activate Kit (exclusively use Sign In)
Surface “Help” in the nav as its own section along with “About us”
Add headers to individual sections for Customer, Breeder, and More
Implement mega-menu system with supplemental text and icons
Keep blog as its own separate menu item, don’t roll it into a group
Research Phase II
Please note that this phase of research was completed by UX Research at Embark. This research is included because it was crucial in informing my designs.
Participants: 10
Goals
Further validate the efficacy of mega-menu inspired navigation
Discover pain points, difficult, or vague areas of revised navigation
Hypotheses
Users will have a difficult time finding reviews, help, and FAQs
Users will value and leverage link descriptions in finding target content
Users will value ‘quick links’ in the nav bar (linking without opening the menu)
Test
1. Imagine you are interested in DNA testing your dog, you visit a company’s website to learn more. We will ask you to navigate to where you think specific information is located.
2. In the menu, where would you navigate to find what breeds of dog the company screens for? Explain your answer out loud.
3. If you wanted to find what health conditions the company screens for, where would you navigate to? Explain your answer out loud.
4. Where would you navigate to find what physical traits the company screens for? Explain your answer out loud.
5. If you wanted to compare the features in the different products, where would you navigate to? Explain your answer out loud.
6. Where would you navigate to sign into the website if you already purchased a kit? Explain your answer out loud.
7. If you were interested in reading this company’s blog, where would you navigate to? Explain your answer out loud.
8. If you could wave a magic wand and the sky’s the limit, what would you change, add, or remove from the navigation, how would you organize it? How would you change it? Spend one to two minutes.
Key Findings
Many users instinctively know the search, account, and shop icons. All users who engaged those icons successfully navigated the requested tasks, other users found secondary paths in the menu for signing in and comparing kits.
Users expect search options to surface narrowly-scoped/specific information such as the breeds they are interested in
Users require an arrow suffix or color differentiator for mega-menu links
Users expect blog under “For all” section near “About us”
Users enter comparison via features’ ‘help me choose’ and via top-level links
Some users disliked “for all dogkind” and opt for “for everyone”
Some users preferred having “Help” located in “For all”
Recommendations
Proceed with this proposed direction with slight adjustments
Link headlines have trailing arrow and color differentiation for links
Begin work on site-wide search as some users value it
Transition to icon based sign-in and shop kits
So, now what?
Consolidated research points considered for 2 proposed solutions to develop & test in A/B/C test on site
Structure
Reevaluate the links we are presenting. Streamline navigation to include only necessary or beneficial links, and remove the two-tier navigation structure. Introducing a ‘mega menu’ with clear headers is a good replacement for the two tier structure, but we should be clear about differentiation.
Users require an arrow suffix or color differentiator for megamenu links
Reorganize links. Ensure links are listed under the most relevant top nav item and relevant links are grouped together.
Users had choice paralysis surrounding too many similar or vague links are grouped together
Add headers to individual sections for Customer, Breeder, and More
Language
Evaluate language and revise where necessary. Ensure top link and subcopy language is informative and succinct. Customers are confused by our terminology; supplemental text can help customers navigate effectively.
Users were somewhat confused with the term ‘Features’ for product features”
Many users instinctively know the search, account, and shop icons
Some users disliked “for all dogkind” and opt for “for everyone”
Many Users found the supplemental text helpful when navigating the menu
Change “features” to “what’s included” or “What’s in the kit?”
Navigation Elements
Add subcopy to help provide high level information without distracting the customer.
Add navigation to shopify pages (eventually). Customers expect navigation to have standard elements
Add search feature (eventually).
Many users desire a search feature to search individual breeds & conditions
Final Prototypes
Test Nav A
Shop & Learn Structure
Test Nav B
Pet Parents, Breeders, & All Dog Lovers Structure
Test Results
Nav designs A & B were tested against the control navigation in an A/B/C test.
Both new navigation designs beat the control, but ultimately Test Nav A (Shop/Learn) won.
Variation A provided a +4% increase in session level conversion rate, a +3% increase in customer level conversion rate and a +2% increase in revenue per session.
Additionally, we were able to segment this data by a number of dimensions to better understand the impact.
New vs. Returning Users: Returning users saw the largest positive impact, indicating that the new navigation provides a frictionless shopping experience for our high intent customers. The neutral result measured in our new user segment was likely also due to intent – these users weren’t planning on making a purchase. Our goal with this new user group was to move them to a higher intent bucket, which isn't measured with conversion rates.
New: Neutral (trending positive)
Returning: +6% increase in conversion rate
Mobile vs. Desktop: We saw a larger positive impact on mobile than desktop, which was a win, as 75% of our customers visited on a mobile device.
Mobile: +4% increase in conversion rate
Desktop: +2% increase in conversion rate