Telegraph Garden Shop - UX Review

Summary Report Feb 2016 1
Garden Shop
UX review
Feb 2016
Sophia Akrofi Design Research,
Telegraph Media Group

Summary Report March 2015 2
Contents
—  Objectives
—  Approach
—  Findings and recommendations

Objectives
Research objectives
—  Conduct an evaluation of the user experience (UX) of
the Garden Shop website
—  Provide recommendations to improve the UX on the
website in the short and longer term.
—  Provide more design context in terms of personas and
experience maps

Approach
Cognitive walkthrough
•  We evaluated the site in the mind set of potential users,
considering the diverse needs that your audience may have
•  The following tasks and scenarios were considered in the
evaluation of the site:
–  First impressions and site structure: User arrives on the home page to
evaluate the Garden Shop site as an option for them to buy gardening
products.
–  Just browsing: User has a vague idea of what they want to buy and is
browsing the site to narrow down their search. They are open to
inspiration and an aspect of randomness to their journey.
–  Targeted search for a specific product: User has specific requirements
in mind. They are less open to other ideas and wish to quickly find the
perfect gardening product.
–  Purchase product: User has selected some items and wants to
purchase them.

Approach
Heuristic review
•  Best practice usability heuristics were used to guide the review and as a
checklist against which to assess the user experience
•  These included considerations relating to:
–  Value proposition
–  Comprehension
–  Navigation
–  Links and calls to action
–  Scrolling and paging
–  Content
–  Information architecture
–  Visual design
–  Interaction design
–  Design for touch
–  Mobile experience
–  Accessibility (physical, sensory, motor)

Findings and recommendations

UX Issues explanation
Most visitors will be unable
to use this aspect of the
experience
Severity Usability issues Persuasion issues
Acts as a strong negative. Convinces visitors
that they should not use the product or service
Most visitors will have
difficulty, but some will find a
way around the problem
Acts as a negative influence on product or
service usage, or fails to take advantage of a
major opportunity to persuade users to do so
Most visitors will easily work
around this problem
Slightly weakens willingness to use the product
or service, or fails to take advantage of a
minor opportunity to persuade users to do so
Critical
(Must be fixed)
Serious
(Should be fixed)
Minor
(Could be fixed)
Good point
Aspects of the design that will
contribute towards a positive
user experience
Acts as a strong positive. Convinces visitors that
they should use the product or service

Brief exploration our overall oﬀer to the customer and how
we diﬀerentiate ourselves from other online garden shops
/ Value to our clients

Quick competitor analysis against ‘our
promises’
Garden shop
promises
100% satisfaction Plants for Every
season and setting
Excellent customer
service
Horticultural know-
how
Delivery to your
door
Actual service provided according to the rest of the site:
Garden Shop Replace damaged
goods (faq)
278 plants Email and phone,
unknown service level
2 articles Standard delivery
service UK
Crocus.co.uk
(largest online shop)
1 year plant
guarantee
3346 plants Email help with choosing,
sourcing, the ‘Plant
doctors’
Per product q&a on web
9-5 weekday phoneline
Inspiration section to
website.
Videos by ‘Plant
doctors’
Troubleshooting
section
Standard delivery
service UK
Hayloft
(Telegraph’s Garden
Shop partner)
21 days ‘no quibble’
guarantee
1574 plants Email & phone,
Unknown service level.
‘Ask a question’ on the
product page
5 years worth of blog
posts
Standard delivery
service UK
Otter farm (small
unusual fruit/veg
plant shop)
No quibble for
seeds
1 year guarantee for
fruit trees, bushes,
perennial plants
405 fruit & veg
plants of exotic
varieties
Email, unknown service
level
Blog and
accompanying
website about Otter
farm & it’s owner
who’s written books
on gardening
Standard delivery
service UK

The site lacks a compelling value
proposition
Recommendation
Determine the site’s value proposition
and ensure that the site and service
reflects this.
If it isn’t clear what the site’s value
proposition is, consider running a Value
Proposition Workshop with the research
team.
Observation
It’s not entirely obvious, what our
value proposition is. Although we
state some benefits on the
homepage, competitors
significantly outweigh us in most of
these areas.

The site design is not congruent with
our promises
Recommendation
Ensure that we can really live up to the
promises we make and we pull these
values into our site design.
Serious
It’s vital that we follow through with our
promises and that they are congruent
with the design of the site. For example
-  The help page does not re-iterate
our ‘100% satisfaction guarantee’
-  There’s no way to ﬁlter for plants by
season
-  Our contact us page does not convey
excellent customer service
-  We don’t provide much know-how
compared to our competitors

User arrives on the home page to evaluate the Garden Shop
site as an option for them to buy gardening products
/ First impressions, home page
and site structure

The homepage is a good space to
communicate our best selling points
Positive
Clear and benefits have been
communicated on the homepage
Recommendation
Clarify the site’s value proposition and
ensure that the site and service reflects
this.
If it isn’t clear what the site’s value
proposition is, consider running a Value
Proposition Workshop with the research
team.
Serious
It’s not entirely obvious, what our
value proposition is, however.
These benefits are fairly common
amongst our competitors. How is
our site unique, relevant and
beneficial?

Scrolling hero banner is cluttered and
lacks contrast
Serious
Although it is important for us to
describe how our site is unique
compared to others, we use a lot of
text here to describe the new shop.
This makes the hero image difficult
to parse particularly on the scrolling
banner, which is only seen for a brief
amount of time.
Recommendation
Ensure that this first hero image is eye
catching and critical information is pulled
out visually. Try to reduce information
density at this top level, and consider
pushing less important information to a
different part of the page/site e.g. the
footer/about page.
Increase the contrast ratio between the
foreground and background colour. This
will make this top level title easier to read
and give it more visual prominence.
Serious
Colour contrast for the
main title is pretty low,
making it hard to read.

Inconsistent visual treatment for the
newsletter signup page
Serious
The visual treatment of the
newsletter page is completely
diﬀerent to the Garden Shop. This is
very jarring and could confuse users.
Recommendation
If possible, re-skin this page so it looks
like it is part of the Garden Shop site.

No way to access Articles on the main
navigation
Serious
Curated product articles bring a
human element to the relatively
automated site and are heavy
investment to create. These should
therefore be accessible on the main
menu.
Recommendation
Provide a link to Articles on the main
menu.

No way to get to Sundries category from
the main navigation
Serious
The Sundries category that is
available at the bottom of the
homepage is not listed on the main
navigation.
Recommendation
Ensure that users can access all key
categories using the main navigation
menu

Cannot click on the ‘Recent offers’ text
Serious
You cannot click on the ‘Recent
offers’ text. This is inconsistent with
the rest of the page.
Recommendation
Link the text for ‘Recent offers’ to the
appropriate product page.

What makes certain listings ‘Offers’ is
unclear
Serious
We don’t make it clear what is special
about ‘Recent offers’ or ‘Readers
offers’.
Recommendation
If offers are special in some way, it’s
worth highlighting this on item listing and
on the product page e.g. ‘free p&p’ ‘save
£25’

Lack of clarity about what the
newsletter will contain
Minor
It’s not clear what exactly will be in
the newsletter. Furthermore, do we
mean ‘Telegraph Garden’ (which
could be referring to the Gardening
section in the Telegraph) or
‘Telegraph Garden Shop’ emails?
Recommendation
If possible, re-skin this page so it looks
like it is part of the Garden Shop site.

The featured section has a unhelpful
title on the homepage
Minor
The title, ‘Garden Shop, by …’ doesn’t
really convey the purpose of this
featured section on the homepage.
Recommendation
Consider changing this title so that the
purpose of this section is conveyed. For
example, something like ‘Spring
Inspiration’ communicates the fact that
this section is updated and provides
timely inspiration.

Weak connection to the Telegraph
newspaper reader offers
Minor
More could be done to make it easy
for readers to recognise and
remember offers from the Telegraph
paper.
Recommendation
Consistently use the same wording and
visuals on the online offer e.g. ‘Save £25’,
‘Free p&p’
Consider including information about
which edition each offer was available.

No about us page
Minor
Include an about us page that
explains the advantages of buying
products from the site.
Recommendation
Include information on an about us
page to provide further information
about what is unique about this site and
why it is an ideal place to purchase
plants.
E.g. Perhaps we have exceptionally well
cared for plants and we could explain
the process, or the Telegraph has hand-
picked every item, or this could be an
opportunity to provide bios of the
experts that are ready to give advice.
crocus.co.uk

User utilises Garden Shop on their smartphone
/ Mobile site

Inconsistent mobile menu styling
Critical
Using ‘Less/More’ for the main menu
is inconsistent with most mobile
websites, including the Telegraph.
Recommendation
Restyle the menu so it is consistent with
other websites – on the main Telegraph
mobile site, a burger menu is displayed
on the left hand side.

Visual treatment of the mobile menu is
very diﬃcult to parse
Critical
Generally the menu is diﬃcult to
parse. A few things contribute to this:
-  The menu is not visually
distinguished from the rest of the
page
-  The main items are centre aligned
where as the sub-items are left
aligned, making items harder to
scan.
-  The styling of the main-items
(apart from alignment) is very
similar to the sub-items, making
the title hierarchy hard to
distinguish.
Recommendation
Restyle the menu so it is easy to scan and
the hierarchy is clear.

Touch targets can be too small
Serious
Touch targets e.g. items in the menu
and the ﬁlter option are too small.
Recommendation
A generally touch targets should be large
enough so that users can accurately tap
on it.
The Android guidelines suggest around
7-9 mm.
Ensure that all targets on mobile are
large enough.

Filter layout is not intuitive when you
scroll down
Serious
When you open the filter panel, you
can scroll down to view the filtered
items. However, you can only see a
half the item card (you cannot scroll
horizontally). To see the full card, you
need to scroll back up to the top of
the page and tap the ‘filter’ link to
close this view.
This is particularly an issue when you
have a large list of items.
Recommendation
Consider rethinking the interaction
between the item list and the filter view
so its more intuitive.
e.g. the filter section could be a drawer
that sweeps out over the item list,
tapping on any item automatically closes
that draw and takes you back to the item
page.

Imbalanced layout for search cards on
mobile site
Minor
Search result cards on mobile site
are left aligned leaving a large gap on
the right. This looks visually
imbalanced and lacks polish.
Recommendation
Restyle cards so they neatly ﬁt the mobile
screen size.

User has a vague idea of what they want and is browsing the
site for ideas. They are open to inspiration and an aspect of
randomness to their journey.
/ Just browsing

A number of ‘no photo’ results
Serious
Plants without pictures often feature
on searches. Sometimes it’s a top hit.
Not only does this lack visual appeal,
but having no visual reference,
makes it diﬃcult for users to choose
between plants.
Recommendation
Strive to provide photos for all products,
particularly popular ones that come out
as top hits in searches.
Consider using more neutral colours for
the no-photo image, as the purple is
really pops on the page, drawing
attention away from genuine photos.

No explanation why some products are
£0.00
Serious
There are supposedly free products
available, but it’s not always clear
why.
Recommendation
Presumably this is some sort of bug or a
special offer.
It’s important that special offers such as
this (if this is the case) are highlighted as
such, as a free product looks like a
mistake.
Consider including a special offer tag on
search results too.

Confusing text ‘Search results’ is
displayed when you click on a category.
Serious
To the user, browsing categories is a
diﬀerent experience to search
(although browse uses the same
mechanism to search). It is confusing,
therefore, that categories in the
menu take you to a page titled
‘Search results’
Recommendation
Replace ‘Search results for’ with ‘Results
for’. This will cover both the search and
browse usecase.

Do we have the right product attributes
on our product pages?
Garden
shop
Crocus Jackson
Nurseries
Rhs plant
lookup
Flower colour
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Foliage colour
✓
Hardiness
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Flowering Time
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Aspect
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Height
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Spread
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Type of garden
✓
Soil
✓ ✓ ✓
Rate of growth
✓ ✓
Foliage
✓ ✓
Fragrance
✓ ✓
Observation:
Do we have the right product
attributes on our pages?
Recommendation
By providing the right information
required to make a product purchase
decision, users may be encouraged to
say on the page and complete purchases.
Consider doing user testing / AB testing
to determine what attributes are
necessary for purchase.

e.g. Missing harvest time and taste for
fruit products
Serious
Harvest Time is missing from the fruit
product stats list.
Furthermore, information about the
taste/usage of the fruit will help
customers choose between diﬀerent
varieties.
Recommendation
Provide further information about the
fruit e.g. Harvest Time, Taste, usage etc.

Duplicate-looking product listings
Serious
On the search page it looks like the
same product is being offered more
than once. This occurs throughout
the site.
Recommendation
If possible, try to display distinguishing
features on the search result level. For
example, show plant pictures that
highlight the differences or explain the
difference in the name.
In the case of the Begonias, the cheaper
offer is for less bulbs. Here we could
collapse these offers into one listing, with
the different bulb numbers as options on
the product page.
The holly trees have slightly different
specifications e.g. fully hardy vs hardy.
Perhaps more could be done to highlight
and explain these differences in the
product description.

It is not immediately clear what colour
refers to
Minor
It is not clear which colour the ﬁlter
‘colour’ is referring to. Presumably it’s
the ﬂower colour.
Recommendation
Consider adding an extra word to make it
clear what colour is referring e.g. ‘Flower
Colour’

Photos can be of poor quality and are
generally from one angle
Minor
Generally, the photos on the site aren’t of the
highest quality and are of a single angle, making it
diﬃcult for users to see what a plant would look
like in their garden.
Recommendation
Good photos increase online retail conversion rates
and help users understand what their product will look
like in the garden.
Replace bad quality photos with better ones and
consider replacing all the photos with high quality
images.
Allow users to expand and zoom into images
Provide various angles to inform/inspire users e.g. a
close up of the ﬂower, a shot with the full plant and a
shot of the plant in the garden/pot.
Serious
Some photos are particularly poor e.g. Rosa New
Year is stretched, Geranium Versicolor is very
grainy.

Visual design makes it hard to scan
through products
Minor
In general the results page is hard to
scan.
Various elements of the visual design
contribute to this:
E.g. search result tiles are of varying
sizes so it is diﬃcult for users to scan
and compare results .
Scanning left to right is hard since
your eye has to move up and down
to compare the images, and
scanning downwards is hard
because the diﬀerent types of
metadata aren’t lined up side by
side.
Recommendation
In general, minimize visual clutter.
Ensure that result cards are of a uniform
size so users can scan through the
products quickly.

Visual design makes it hard to scan
through products
Minor
Furthermore, the Info link is
redundant and introduces
unnecessary visual clutter distracting
the user from more important
information.
Recommendation
Remove the ‘Info’ button and ensure that
the product name links to more
information. Use an on-hover change to
hint to users that they can click through
to more info
Minor
Heavy shading of the tiles also
contributes to unnecessary visual
noise.
Recommendation
Make the shading more subtle.

Cannot click on plant names
Minor
Plant names on search results are
not clickable.
Recommendation
Make the plant name clickable as this
would be expected behaviour.

Inconsistent and unnecessary search
display transition
Minor
Sometimes immediately after
displaying search results, the items
shuﬄe around on the screen. This
transition is unnecessary and
inconsistent and might confuse
users.
Recommendation
Remove this transition and display items
in the intended order.

No links to other related products in the
details page
Minor
There are no links to other products,
on the details page.
Users who are browsing the shop
may be interested in seeing other
related items.
Recommendation
Provide related items on the details page
and encourage further browsing. For
example we could list items commonly
bought together or similar items.
Another option is to allow users to click
on the product attributes to bring up
related items e.g. ‘sunny’ links to a search
for all items that are tagged with ‘sunny’.

Minimal content to inspire browsing
users
Minor
Apart from the ‘Garden Shop
Articles’, there’s a lack of content to
inspire users, which assumes that
the user already has a good idea of
what they want to buy.
Recommendation
Not all users will have a speciﬁc product
in mind when they come to the site.
By providing more content that can
inspire users, we help users clarify their
needs and encourage sales.
For example, there’s a big opportunity
here to link the site to relevant Telegraph
articles and videos, inspiring users with
quality editorial and strengthening brand
association.

Inconsistent use of category name:
‘Bedding plants’ vs ‘Annuals’
Minor
Plant_category is displaying as
‘Annuals’ when the menu name is
‘Bedding plants’. This introduces
cognitive dissonance and could
confuse users.
Furthermore, technically, not all
bedding plants are annuals.
Recommendation
Determine what this category actually
refers to and consider using it
consistently throughout the site.

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Garden Shop 0 item(s) £0.00 Checkout »
Home | Plants | Offers | Contact | Search
Three Sumptuous Dahlias
By plant buyer, Lark Hanham.
With giant sumptuous blooms from mid-summer to late autumn, these tuber-
rooted perennials are great for adding late seasonal interest and are large enough
to stand-alone plant in a pot but equally perfect for plugging gaps.
Originating from the mountainous areas of Central America, they require full-sun
and deep fertile soil. They’re considered hardy but will need help to overwinter.
Preparation is key to success. The perfect time to plant Dahlias is when there is no
risk of frost. Dead-heading, pinching-out, and ample feeding is also required.
Topped off with some essential winter protection.
Whether lifting and storing tubers in a frost-free ventilated place or risking the weather with the double-
mulch method, anyone can grow Dahlias and they’re deﬁantly worth it. The cleverest of designers will use a
mixture of different classes and colours to give the impression of there being many different types of plants.
However, in reality, they all require similar care. Height 60cm and spread 40cm.
Buy our Dahlia mix of all three products below. Info
Varieties
Buy Now
Dahlia Boom Boom Red
Boom Boom Red - Ball Group
Effortlessly mastering breathtakingly-large pom-pom shaped ﬂowers,
this variety starts off orange-red and matures to a cerise with a purple-
blushed centre. With a strong multi-branching structure, it produces
long, stiff clean stems, perfect for cutting and shows ample healthy
vegetation which is less susceptible to Botrytis.
Info Buy Now
Previous GardenShop Articles
06 Feb - Three Fabulous fragrant
Begonias
Relevant articles help inspire gardeners
and promote products
Positive
Including relevant and timely editorial
can help inspire browsing users. It
also reinforces our key promise to
deliver ‘Horticultural know-how’

p 0 item(s) £0.00 Checkout »
Contact | Search
uous Dahlias
m.
ith giant sumptuous blooms from mid-summer to late autumn, these tuber-
oted perennials are great for adding late seasonal interest and are large enough
stand-alone plant in a pot but equally perfect for plugging gaps.
iginating from the mountainous areas of Central America, they require full-sun
d deep fertile soil. They’re considered hardy but will need help to overwinter.
eparation is key to success. The perfect time to plant Dahlias is when there is no
k of frost. Dead-heading, pinching-out, and ample feeding is also required.
pped off with some essential winter protection.
tubers in a frost-free ventilated place or risking the weather with the double-
row Dahlias and they’re deﬁantly worth it. The cleverest of designers will use a
nd colours to give the impression of there being many different types of plants.
equire similar care. Height 60cm and spread 40cm.
e products below. Info Buy Now
Boom Boom Red - Ball Group
Effortlessly mastering breathtakingly-large pom-pom shaped ﬂowers,
this variety starts off orange-red and matures to a cerise with a purple-
blushed centre. With a strong multi-branching structure, it produces
long, stiff clean stems, perfect for cutting and shows ample healthy
vegetation which is less susceptible to Botrytis.
Info Buy Now
Previous GardenShop Articles
06 Feb - Three Fabulous fragrant
Begonias
Missing space between Garden and
Shop on the Articles page
Minor
Missing space between Garden and
Shop
Recommendation
Correct this typo

Product descriptions are evocative and
inspiring
Positive
Appealing to all senses, the general
product descriptions do a good job
of describing what the plant will offer.
“Graced with lustrous dark-green
leaves which provide the perfect
backdrop to its delicate dangling
flowers, come November, masses of
tight buds housing gorgeously-
scented flowers begin to open.

Sometimes it is unclear what product is
being offered
Critical
It’s not at all clear what ‘Cornus Hardy winter
mix’ is. Is it a trio of plants? If so, what’s
Cornus Cornus Collection?
Recommendation
Ensure that product descriptions are clear. If
completely different products are on offer on the
page, include descriptions of them all.

Inconsistent treatment for Latin vs
common names
Minor
Sometimes the product name is just
the Latin name, sometimes it’s the
common name and sometimes it’s
both. This inconsistent usage makes
it diﬃcult for users to know what to
look for.
Furthermore, not all product listings
contain both the common & Latin
name, which means users may miss
products in searches.
Recommendation
Try to be consistent with product names.
Ensure that all product listings contain
both the Latin & common names.

Redundant and irrelevant information
in cultural notes
Minor
Cultural notes sometimes contain
redundant information that is
already available on the page.
Furthermore it also contains,
information that perhaps should be
in the ‘description’ e.g. ‘Award
winning’
Recommendation
Decide what Cultural Notes should
contain and make sure it’s used
consistently throughout the site.

No user reviews for social validation
Minor
Shopping sites normally include user
reviews, helping customers validate
the products and reassure users
before purchase.
Recommendation
Allow users to submit and view user
reviews for each product.
(This is already available in the Telegraph
Shop)

/ Product search
User has speciﬁc requirements in mind. They are
less open to other ideas and wish to quickly ﬁnd
the perfect gardening product.

Lose filtered results when you go back
Critical
Filtered results are lost when you
click on a product and then go back
to this page or when you hit back
after applying several filters
Recommendation
Reduce cognitive load and user effort by
ensuring that filtered results are retained
between pages.
Furthermore, allow users to go back to
previous filtering operations as research
shows this is generally the expected
behavior. E.g. if the user applies a colour
filter and then a species filter, when they
hit back they should see results with the
colour filter applied.

You cannot filter across all plants
Serious
Users who want to filter across all
plants are unable to do so as they
are forced to first select a category.
Recommendation
Allow users to filter across all plants.

Limited and unoptimised filter
Serious
In general our product filter could be
significantly improved.
Various issues affect the filter.
- Limited number of filter types
-  Long list of options that are hard
to compare and scan
-  Not immediately clear what filters
have been applied.
Recommendations on the next page

Limited and unoptimised filter
Recommendations
Filters allow users to progressively hone
into their ideal product particularly when
they don’t have a clear idea of what they
want. Meaningful filters can be powerful.
-  Do research to see if we are missing
any categories e.g. special offers,
featured in the newspaper
-  Improve the Interaction Design of the
filter so it’s easier to use e.g. Display a
summary list of applied filters that
users can easily edit
-  Generally all attributes that are
presented as product specs e.g.
amount of light should be available as
a filter.
-  Improve the visual design of the filter
so it’s easier to scan & read e.g. limit
each attribute to one line without
wrapping.
-  For more info http://baymard.com/
blog/macys-filtering-experience
http://www.crocus.co.uk

Search suggests are only sensitive to
exact matches
Minor
Search suggestions (the dropdown
when you search) are only returned
if the term is an exact match and
does not account for names where
the search term comes later e.g. the
term ‘Lingholm’ should display the
suggest ‘Meconopis Lingholm Blue’
Not all users will remember the full
name and will enter partial search
terms.
Recommendation
Reduce cognitive load and user eﬀort by
ensuring that names that include the
search term are also shown as
suggestions.

Search results do not accommodate for
spelling mistakes
Minor
Our results do not accommodate for
typos, which means users are less
likely to ﬁnd what they are looking
for.
Recommendation
Show alternative results that best match
the search term when nothing is found.

No suggested alternatives when a
search returns nothing
Minor
When no search results are available
the site returns a blank screen. This
is a missed opportunity to suggest
other alternatives.
Recommendation
Use the blank space to suggest relevant
alternatives or interesting oﬀers.

User has viewed the site and now wishes to purchase some
products
/ Product purchase

A different price is displayed on the cart
when you add an item
Critical
A different price is shown on the cart
compared to the product price.
Although this is later explained when
you click through (20% discount), at
this point, the user has no idea that a
discount is applied. The flow feels
disconnected and broken and could
be interpreted as untrustworthy.
Recommendation
Highlight that a discount is being applied
e.g. include info next to the cart or show
the discount on all the product listings

Missing an FAQ
Critical
No FAQ is included for answers to
common questions e.g. delivery
questions, returns etc
Users are therefore forced to email
support for basic questions, which
may reduce purchases and increase
support requests.
Recommendation
Include an FAQ that answers common
support questions.

Not immediately clear how you can
purchase offers
Serious
It’s not clear how exactly you can
purchase the Buy 2 Get 1 Free offer.
Some users may not notice that the
second price offering is actually the
deal and will feel confused.
Recommendation
Make it clear very clear how users can
purchase a deal e.g. include text saying
‘Buy 2 get 1 free offer’ against the price.
Preferably auto-apply the offer if users
enter the right number of plants (in this
case if the user enters the Japanese
maple 3 times apply the discount).

The flow is not optimised for checkout
Serious
In general the checkout flow could
do with more UX thought. This is a
critical point in the flow and impacts
purchase numbers. Users have
already decided that they want to
buy something, so it’s particularly
frustrating for both the user and us if
we lose them at this point.
Recommendation
Rethink the flow with proper UX design or
a choose a plugin that has had good UX
design applied

Timeout error message is unhelpful
Critical
After a period of time, the following
error message is displayed –
presumably it’s due to a timeout.
Without clear error messages
guiding users through payment
issues, potential clients may abandon
their purchase.
Recommendation
By providing clear feedback about what
exactly went wrong, we can help users
recover and we can decrease the
number of abandoned purchases.
Also consider using a custom error
message design, as the generic pop-up
may be mistaken for spam.

Login/register screen is not intuitive
Serious
Do we really need to show this log in/register
option now? Research has shown that adding a
login feature can signiﬁcantly impact sales.
There are also too many messages/options
going on here and the layout is not intuitive.
For example, the wording is confusing as it
requires users to recall two things
simultaneously. i.e. if they have been back to
the site before and if they have a password.
Recommendation on next page

Login/register screen is not intuitive
Recommendation
Simplify. Ensure that only the essential steps are
given as each one could reduce purchases.
Test diﬀerent ﬂows to see what works.
Some options are to jump straight into taking
address details with an option to login (or register
later)
Others ask if you’d like to checkout as a guest.

No way to view details of items in cart
Serious
There’s no way users can check to
see the details of what is in their cart.
Not all users will remember what
they have bought – providing a link
will save them time and prevent
abandoned purchases.
Recommendation
Provide a link back to the product details
(or show them on as a lightbox).
Include small thumbnails of the product,
as some users will recognise the product
visually.

Provide an explanation of the discount
applied
Serious
Currently there’s no explanation on
the site about a 20% discount.
Without any explanation this
checkout experience can feel
arbitrary and unprofessional.
Recommendation
Add a more descriptive name or
explanation of why a discount was
applied. E.g. ‘Launch discount’

Only basic validation is available on all
the checkout forms
Serious
Only very basic validation (email &
empty field validation) is provided on
the payment forms.
Errors at this point could lead to
serious complications later e.g.
deliveries being sent to the wrong
location.
Recommendation
Consider including more specific
validation and appropriate form fields.
E.g. addresses can be entered using a
postcode lookup. Telephone numbers
can be checked for non-numeric
characters. If we only deliver to the UK
we should remove the option to change
the country and validate that all
addresses are UK based.

No indication that the card payment
system is secure
Serious
There is no indication that the
payment system is secure.
Users may not feel safe when
entering in their card details.
Recommendation
Users often abandon payment because
the site doesn’t look secure enough.
Include security information and visual
design to reassure users that their
payment will be handled professionally
and securely e.g.:

Make it clear what CVV is
Serious
Not all clients will understand the
term CCV and know where to ﬁnd it
on their credit card.
Recommendation
Include help information on where to ﬁnd
the CVV code on a card.
Consider renaming CVV to a more user
friendly name e.g. ‘Security Code’

Lose your place on the page when you
buy an item
Minor
When you click buy, without warning,
you’re taken up to the top of the
page to show you that the shopping
cart has been updated. Users
therefore, have to scroll back down
to re-ﬁnd their original location,
increasing cognitive load.
Recommendation
Consider rethinking the ‘added to cart’
feedback, so users are not taken away
from their current context.
e.g. pin the shopping cart to the top of
the screen so it’s always accessible or
provide inline feedback.

Improve the UX of the contact us page
Minor
In general, the design of the contact us page
could be improved. As users of commerce
pages are likely to have questions, providing
a seamless contact us service is important
to improve customer satisfaction, loyalty
and ultimately sales.
Recommendations on the next page

Improve the UX of the contact us page
Recommendation
Various changes could be made to significantly
improve this page:
-  Link to an FAQ
-  Perhaps give suggestions of the types of
questions that can be answered. If, for
example
-  Order different contact options by likelyhood
of use. Email is top, followed by phone then
address.
-  Visually differentiate between the different
contact options. Phone, address, email
-  Markup the telephone number so it can be
tapped on when using a smartphone to call
(aka click-to-call)
-  Provide availability times for the telephone
number so users have an expectation of the
service.
-  Do we really need the ‘Company’ details and
‘phone number’? Research shows more fields
reduce the number of completed forms,
particularly a telephone number field.
-  Style the contact form in the house style

User Experience Research Team

Telegraph Garden Shop - UX Review

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