User Satisfaction from Navigation, Design, Content | Learnings and Actions

I sat in a meeting that went over the survey results going over the new site that relaunched back in 2008. As I’ve mentioned on my previous posts on 4Q Iperceptions, acquiring qualitative insights are powerful as measuring traffic on your site.

The survey firm utilized the ACSI (American Consumer Satisfaction Index) which is a method developed by University of Michigan to measure consumer satisfaction. Although the new site scored higher than the old site, it was really interesting to look at what aspect of the new site contributed higher score.

Design
The new site scored higher in user satisfaction when it came to the design. The old site was so old, I’m sure no matter what you did, it would have scored higher. Measuring user satisfaction on site design is pretty interesting because how the site looks could totally affect page views and bounce rates on the site.

Navigation
Extensive amount of efforts were put into the the navigational elements of the site. Users felt the new site provided ease of use and better navigational experience. So the satisfaction index was fair. However, the site is about recipes, and it does not provide the best navigational experience there because the internal search and recipe search functionality were confusing in terms of design.

The search box was shared with internal and recipe search, and users had to select the proper tab to fulfill their mission.

From web analytics stand point, it was obvious that users were confused because the terms users entered into the box were recipe related for both internally searched terms and recipes searched.

Content
What is unfortunate about the new site is a lot of the recipes on the old site was taken out (Don’t ask why…). Therefore a lot of the users who referred to the new site for the recipe from the old site did not find the recipe they wanted to acquire.

Web analytics showed higher referrals and direct entries to the home page, because users visiting the old recipe that no longer exist on the site would get redirected to the home page. That caused higher bounce rate on the home page as well.

Summary
The survey analysis showed overall satisfaction of the new site was supported by the new design. Fresh design with easier navigational experience contributed to fair level of satisfaction. The caveat is that there are design fatigue when users start to get use to the site. So it is likely that your user satisfaction with design will go down, if they keep on revisit your site.

It is imperative to take actions in delivering the changes required to increase your user satisfaction. These actionable insights acquired quantitatively and qualitatively allow you to decide that actions you need to take. Also forecasting how your site visitors will feel and consume content will give another sense of what you need to do.

Once, you make your changes, measure and assess your data again. Your satisfied users will likely to return to your site, and become your advocates. Good luck!!