Improving the user experience to better help Service Area Businesses

How I redesigned the user experience for service area businesses and achieved a 3x conversion improvement and eliminated daily support complaints

Project Timeline

8 weeks

38 daily SABS

3x Uplift

Team Impact

0 CS Enquiries

Role

Solo Designer

Problem

Service Area Businesses faced significant barriers when trying to add their locations to the BrightLocal platform. This came to our attention when we carried out user interviews as well as through daily customer support enquiries.

Service Area Businesses (SABs) operate without a physical storefront that customers visit. Instead, they travel to their customers' locations to provide services such as a plumber, massage therapist or mobile pet groomer.

Service Area Businesses (SABs) operate without a physical storefront that customers visit. Instead, they travel to their customers' locations to provide services such as a plumber, massage therapist or mobile pet groomer.

The key pain points identified were:

  • Privacy Concerns
    SABs didn't want residential addresses visible on public listings

  • Confusing UX
    Throughout the platform, the user experience was confusing for SABs, most markedly when adding a location but also throughout the tools

  • Daily Support Issues
    This was leading to frequent complaints which was costing the business time and resources

SABs struggled to add a location, which in turn meant they didn't unlock the value of the BrightLocal platform.

Home

My Story

CV

Home

Design Journey

CV

Design Process

As we had identified the key pain points through research and close communication with the customer support team, I choose a two step design process.

  1. User Journey Mapping

  1. User Journey Mapping

I first mapped out the user journey for SABs and other user groups to add a location, identifying any friction points or opportunities for improvement

I first mapped out the user journey for SABs and other user groups to add a location, identifying any friction points or opportunities for improvement

  1. User Flow Redesign

  1. User Flow Redesign

I redesigned the user flows for SABs and the other user groups, reducing confusion and using this as an opportunity to create new golden paths for all users

I redesigned the user flows for SABs and the other user groups, reducing confusion and using this as an opportunity to create new golden paths for all users

Measurement & Tracking Setup

Before this project, we had no tracking infrastructure in place to measure the success of our location wizard and without baseline metrics, we couldn't quantify the impact of our improvements or make data-driven decisions.

Therefore, we worked together cross-functionally to set this tracking up pre-release.

Cross-Functional Collaboration:


  • Data & Insights Analyst Partnership
    Collaborated to define key metrics, establish baseline measurements, and create comprehensive tracking specifications for user behaviour analysis

  • Front-End Engineer Collaboration
    Worked together to implement tracking events, ensure data quality, and validate that all user interactions were properly captured

  • Google Analytics Setup
    Configured comprehensive GA tracking to monitor user journeys, conversion funnels, and business-type specific behaviours post-launch

Solution Overview

Below outlines the solution for the newly improved user journeys

Golden Path Design

Design the golden for every user group to add a location in a way that is intuitive, and frictionless and helps them get value out of the platform as fast as possible

Make Every Word Count

I applied our design principle 'Make Every Word Count' by cutting down the lengthy copy currently in the Add Location Wizard

Keep It Consistent

Ensure that any changes were consistent with other areas of the platform

High-fidelity Prototypes

As the next stage, I used Figma to draw up the triaged user flow and carried out some user testing with our customer support team via a Figma prototype and three tasks to complete.

Impact Metrics

The graph below shows the impact the newly improved designs had on conversion, with an instant improvement.

3x

Conversion Rate

Improvement

38

New SABs

Added Daily

0

Customer Support

Complaints

100%

Overnight

Success

Methods

User Research

Product Strategy

UI Design

Interaction Design

Usability Testing

Tools

Figjam

Figma

Zendesk

Key Takeaways

What learnings did I take from the project?

User-centric

Understanding specific user needs leads to targeted, effective solutions and tangible business outcomes

Measurable Impact

Good UX design can directly translate to improved business metrics however without tracking it's very difficult to measure success

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