A Digital Experience Agency

The UX of being a mom and other website optimization tips

Just like a site flow, the day of a mom has its own happy path and those dreaded errors and pitfalls. How we recover is key to how our experience is perceived.

Distractions

Inundated with pop-ups pulling attention away from the task at hand–such as “Mom can you sew me a cape before school?” or “Can you help me wipe?”–my routine is thrown off and my focus turns away from the other 2,343 things I have to do. Displaying ads in the middle of content–or launching a survey or an email opt-in pop-up that isn’t relevant–similarly distracts your users’ attention and causes friction and stress along their happy path. Find more creative and subtle ways to redirect their attention at more appropriate times, like these brands:

Bellroy.com

Their feedback form makes it feel like a human will actually read it! The website feedback pop-over is simple, real and looks like their own site, not some 3rd party tomfoolery. This makes users more confident the brand is going to listen and consider the feedback provided, so worth my time.

bellroy

GAP.com

Before I’m too enthralled in the shopping experience, I get an email opt-in pop-over that asks if I want to be the “first to know” and save 25% off my purchase. Seems like this is a great incentive, but if I’m not interested it’s not a waste of my time nor hard to close out of.

gap

LandofNod.com

Online chat can be annoying. But Land Of Nod found an elegant way to nudge me with a simply designed chat box kindly asking if I needed help on the page that I was clearly spending lots of time on. No chasing down a floating box or trying to close it with no x out options. Simple. Off to the side of content. And sweet.

land-of-nod

Testing limits

Children have a natural way of testing mom’s limits. Tantrums, insulting hard-cooked meals and the inevitable questions as to why your belly or butt is so big are just a few examples. Asking for unnecessary information in your forms or making forms long or cumbersome tests your users instead of benefiting them. Don’t push your users past their limits, help them get through these boundaries quickly and easily, like these brands:

Cottonbureau.com

I never have to leave the product page if I don’t want to. Everything slides left and I just keep on trucking through the process with excitement. It feels like I’m priority in line at the airport.

cotton-bureau

Bellroy.com

It’s all right here. No sliding, no clicking through multiple pages. Just one page. Quick. Easy. Clear. Checking out is a breeze.bellroy3

First impressions

Unlike some moms, I don’t do the best job pulling off the I’ve-got-it-all-under-control look. My hair isn’t brushed, my socks don’t match, and I show up late to everything. Sometimes it’s because I’m going that extra mile to make the “dress as your favorite transportation operator” costume the night before school. But for teacher conferences or new business pitches, I find a way to shine on the got-it-together-look so my audience can take me seriously and my first impressions are positive. As with websites, visual appeal and intuitive navigation have the biggest influence on people’s first impressions of your site. A study found first impressions are 94% design related. If your site looks circa 2002, people will not trust it nor find value, regardless of the golden nuggets that await them. Not to mention if you are still neglecting to doll it up for mobile, you’re missing out. Recent brands who took the plunge to responsive design:

ESPN.com

For too long, ESPN rolled with a very clunky design. Recently they updated their site to allow for user customization, personalization and responsive design. It was met with some heavy critique but hey, not everyone likes change (and no one likes to mess with how they get their scores).

Before

ESPN-old

After

ESPN_new

Apple.com

Their store isn’t a separate portal anymore! The product and checkout is in the path as the user conducts product research. The look of the site didn’t change much but the interactions you have with it greatly improved to meet customers needs and provide a more intuitive flow.

Before

Apple_old

After

Apple-New

Time is treasure

You hear it all the time. “There’s just not enough time in the day.” Well it certainly feels that way most days and some days it is fact. If a website is loading as slowly as it takes my toddler–who is demanding to get dressed herself–to walk out the door, you’ve lost me. In fact, NN Group found you have 10 seconds to leave an impression and tell me what I will get out of the site/company before I bail.

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KISSmetrics graphic

Do you have any tips and tricks on improving the parenthood or website experience? Let us know in the comments below.