Designing for discovery
CASE study: Stubhub
Outcome
The enhancements made through this project reduced bounce rates, optimized search results and led to a personalized discovery experience for the customers.
It was an end-end experience was designed for a responsive web platform.
Background
StubHub is the world’s largest ticket marketplace with tickets available for over 10 million live sports, music and theatre events in more than 40 countries. The platform allows experience-seekers to buy and sell tickets through our website and mobile app.
stubhub : HOME PAGE
Audience & Problem
The bounce rate for the discovery and search is significantly high, leading to a low sell-through rate.
Research shows that comparison shopping is a common behavior when buying tickets to live events. Majority people search for events on mobile devices.
When a potential buyer is comparing tickets across different platforms, on StubHub they are presented with a long list of events. The discovery and search experience is time-consuming and overwhelming.
Approach
Doing an end - end audit of the entire top of the funnel, I came up with with recommendations to address some the key points of friction in the discovery and search experiences.
The approach was to look at customer behavior and make focused changes to the key moments in the journey. Some of these recommendations were quick wins while others had a longer iteration cycle.
competitive analysis
Through research we learned that comparison shopping was common user behavior in the early stages of the buying process.
We looked at the some the key competitors buyers could be looking at across our two main genres, Sports and Music.
Home page redesign
Observations
I studied discovery experiences of some of our competitors. I noticed that there was an opportunity for StubHub to differentiate itself by using bold imagery and a mobile first experience.
Data shows that more than 50% of visitors on the home screen go directly to the search bar instead of scrolling.
In the event list UI, the buyer has to make decision about who (artist/team), when (date) and where (venue) at the same time. This causes cognitive overload, leading to them to leave the site or use the search bar.
In our 1:1 interviews, we learned that the customer's connection to an artist/ team is emotional decision, whereas selecting a date and location is a logical decision.
Home page redesign: HypothesEs
1. Replacing list-view of events to showcase bold imagery of personalized geo-popular artist/team cards will emotionally motivate site visitors and differentiate us from the competitors
2. Introducing genre-based navigation tiles will show the breadth of inventory available and thereby inspiring the visitors to browse easily.
home page responsive layout
Predictive search redesign
Observations
Behavioral data shows that, on average, a customer uses the search box 2 to 3 times during a visit.
Currently, the predictive search suggestions are generated by a keyword match and do not give the user any leading information that might help them make a buying decision.
In majority scenarios, search leads the customer to zero events which can be frustrating.
predictive search redesign: HypothesEs
1. Suggesting upcoming events of the most popular artist in the area, will reduce the number of search per visit.
2. Displaying date and location as subtext in search suggestions will will reduce the number of steps to purchase.
Product page redesign
Observations
Data shows that the bounce rate from the product page is significantly high. On this page, events are presented in a long list grouped by location (nearby and away).
Based on a qualitative research study, people expressed difficulty narrowing down options using the list view. Given the seasonal nature of inventory for both teams and artists, the date filter could lead to several zero events scenarios, which could be frustrating for users.
product page redesign: Hypothesis
Introduce a calendar UI so the customer is able to see the event schedule in a quick glance. This would reduce unnecessary scrolling and the user will easily find a date that suits their schedule.
product page responsive design
Impact
An increase in repeat visitors.
An increase in favoriting activity.
To monitor click rate on navigation tiles.
Next Steps
Looking at behavioral data I learned that most buyers aimed went directly to search instead of browsing on the home page. As a next steps I would propose working with existing behaviors and testing discovery and recommendation modules within the search experience.
This would help us understand the buyers browsing behaviors eventually leading to a more relevant home page experience.