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Honda Online Shopping Tools Redesign
Continuing Honda’s story of reliability, innovation and People First, to the online experience, by creating intuitive, responsive and seamlessly connected car shopping tools.
My Role
UX/UI Lead, Research, Prototyping, Product Design, and Motion Design
Challenge: The online experience didn’t match the brand
The online experience didn’t represent Honda’s reputation for quality and innovation, as it was slow, clunky and frustrating to use. More importantly, the experience across shopping tools wasn’t seamless. For instance, if someone wanted to search for the car they built, they would have to start over, because the website wouldn’t carry their build information into the search inventory tool. Since shopping tools made up 90% of the site, this issue affected every part of the online experience.
Solution: A suite of interconnected shopping tools
Our mission was to rebuild and seamlessly connect every part of the online shopping process, using a human-centered approach, the latest web/CMS capabilities, and Honda’s beloved brand voice. Our goal was to create a first-rate customer experience, increase shopping tool engagement, and to sell more Honda vehicles as a result.
The Results
The better experience yielded way better KPIs: A significant increase in Inventory Search page views, Mobile Build & Price views, Request a Quote submissions, and a huge improvement in CTA clicks guiding users to the next step - a successful achievement of our goal to increase lead submissions. These outcomes highlight the effectiveness of our strategies in driving user engagement and conversions.
Inventory Search pageviews increase
+85%
+66%
Clicks to next step in purchase funnel
Increase in request
a quote clicks
+280%
The Shopping Tools
Model vs. Model Comparison
Our research showed that customers were interested in comparing the features of different Honda models, but the capability didn’t previously exist. People could compare trim levels of the same model and competitor models but couldn’t compare different Honda models against each other. We created a brand-new tool that allows shoppers to choose up to three different Honda models and view a convenient comparison of key features.
Shop-by-Feature
Previously, people could see a list of features when looking at a specific trim level. But they couldn’t search based on the features in which they were most interested and see which models fit their preferences. This brand-new tool gave them the power to do this.
Current Offers
Current Offers is the primary destination for Honda’s paid media traffic. We completely redesigned it to better align with the Honda brand, create a better customer experience, and help drive more qualified leads to dealerships. We also optimized it for mobile and enhanced the media landing- page experience. The redesigned tool doubled offer exploration.
Payment Estimator
The previous version of this tool wasn’t smart enough to provide an accurate vehicle cost estimate. Our update connected the Payment Estimator with all the other tools, and took into account any offers available, geographic constraints, state and local taxes, and the user’s FICO score to provide a truly accurate estimated payment projection. People could then adjust key variables to help get the payment to just where they needed it to be. This brought added value to the website and helped pave the way to purchase. As a result, mobile payment estimator usage grew and lead form submission rates increased.
Build & Price
The Build & Price tool is one of the most compelling connection points for engagement and leads. The original tool was frustrating, slow, difficult to use, and experienced high abandonment. Honda and RPA leveraged user testing insights, best practices research within multiple industries, and web analytics data to design and enhance the experience, improving speed, ease-of-use, vehicle understanding, and engagement. As a result, vehicle configuration and the number of users successfully completing their configuration went up measurably.
Search Inventory
As one of the final steps in the customer journey, the Search Inventory tool plays a key role in connecting people to their desired vehicle. Previously, however, this tool never “talked” with the other tools — this upgrade fixed that. People are now able to configure, research, and price-compare within the inventory experience and seamlessly connect to a local dealer. The new tool was also designed to mimic the navigational paradigms of other utilities on the site, especially the Build & Price tool, providing shoppers an intuitive mental map to continue their journey toward a vehicle purchase. As a result, filter usage saw a significant lift, continuation rate through the tool grew, and leads went way up.
Buy Online
For numerous reasons, the final car purchase still needs to be handled by a Honda dealer. But we know there is an increasing desire for people to complete the entire process online, so we incentivized dealers to offer a Buy Online program, and gave those participating dealers additional exposure throughout the website journey.
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