This project was done for the largest big box retailer in the US specializing in sports goods. In this case study I’ll demonstrate all the steps we took in a product development lifecycle as a team and what were my contributions as a UX designer.

Before we jump into the case study, I would love you to sneak pic the end results of the project so you have a better sense of what we were building.

Fundamental problem statement

38% of customers that enter a store leave without a purchase because they either didn’t get the product they came for, or they were still researching**

**Large study was done by a business team interviewing customers who left a store without a purchase

My first step in this project was to dig deeper into this problem to better understand:

• How can we empower teammates with tools to better assist customers with their research and to potentially help customers to make a purchase decision
• How can we use tech to improve product discoverability, so teammates always have something to offer to customers?

I came up with several research initiatives:

Study 1. Exploring Existing technologies (Self-Service kiosk, PDT)

Study 2. Teammates pain point (926 survey responses)

Study 3. Pick the right form factor

Study 4. What features to build?

Study 5. Personalized shopping experience

Study 6. Teammate training

Study 1. Learning how we can enhance existing technologies

At that time, the stores had existing self-service kiosks in a footwear deck, so we wanted to explore if it made sense to enhance these technologies to other departments and what enhancements should be made to improve the UX.

Goals of the study:

• How the size of an in-store self-service kiosk affects the number of customer interactions
• How the location of self-service kiosks can affect the number of customer interactions
• Test different home-screen options of a self-service kiosk to check what design can drive more attention.

A/B test the size of the kiosk

Testing different options of a Home screen

Locations testing:

By the entrance
Power aisle
Inside a department section
By the locker room

Revenue projection model

Study takeaways

• A larger form factor definitely brings more attention from customers with more taps to start an interaction.

• Power Aisle appeared to be the best place for the kiosk that drives the most taps to start an interaction with a kiosk.

• The home screen with brand selection and famous soccer players appeared to be the most appealing for customers, which drove the most taps.
• Projection model didn’t show great results so we didn’t have enough confidence that this is the right solution as of now

Next steps

We decided not to proceed with a larger form factor self service kiosk because of several reasons:

• The features that we are thinking to build is better to pilot with internal associates first as a proof of concept and then scale it to consumer faced version

• A lot of internal logistic, infrastructure, budget, and legal coordination associated with self-service kiosk which can significantly slow down the process 

Study 2. Teammates pain point (926 survey responses)

After exploring some options with a larger screen kiosk for customers, we decided to learn more about our store associates and what is going on in their world. We launched a large survey to learn what are the most difficult questions from athletes and what are the most frequent questions from athletes.

Complete study synthesis you can find here

Study 3. Pick the right form factor

Since we decided to backlog an idea with a larger kiosk form factor for customers, we wanted to explore what our store associates feel about 8 inch and 10 inch tablets compared to the existing 5-inch PDT device they currently use.

• Understand the use cases when TMs prefer using 8″ tablet VS 10″ tablet VS 5″ PDT
• High level understanding of which tablet teammates feel most comfortable using to perform their daily tasks during a shift

Research overview

• 11 stores participated in this study; each store received 2 sample tablets for a few weeks for Teammates to use them in a real-world environment

• Qualtrics survey were sent to all the teammates who participated in a study (40 responses)

Overall average temperature across the hospital. Athletes prefer being helped by a teammate with a tablet over PDT

However Teammates prefer to use smaller PDT over tablet and here is why:

PDT – Pros

• PDT is much easier to hold 
• Doesn’t get in the way of everything
• PDT, tablet and walkie, it is a lot to carry
• The PDT is a lot faster
• It’s much more portable and accessible It is cumbersome, Gets in my way where i’m bending down
• PDT fits in a pocket
• Scanning is faster on PDT

PDT – Cons

• Athletes think that I use my personal phone when using PDT

Tablet – Pros

• Bigger screen, 100% more effective
• Tablet is great for viewing the guides and videos.
• Screen is larger, allowing the athletes to see as well as the teammates. and review more detail about the product
• Better when doing an online order or looking for something more specific. 
• The bigger screen is more athlete friendly 
• We look more professional
• Athletes are comfortable with the tablets and are less hesitant to put their credit card information
• They like that I can order something online on the spot. 

Tablet – Cons

• Tablet is very bulky to carry around it moves around every time you move, and the strap is super uncomfortable.

Store manager overall pick:

Study takeaway

As we can clearly see, a larger form factor compared to PDT is better for clienteling and looks better in front of the customers, but it will take time to scale tablets across all the stores, so we decided to scale gradually and start supporting both form factors 5 inches existing PDT and 8-inch Samsung tablet

Full study synthesis you can fin here

Study 4. What features to build

As we can see from our previous studies, teammates don’t feel comfortable answering questions about unfamiliar products or about the departments they are not familiar with. The goal of this study is to dive deep into this problem space and to see what features can help to breach this gap. We want to understand what information or features will help teammates to be more confident, informed sellers.

44% of athlete’s questions teammates have difficulty answering

Top 5 themes to help teammates be more confident sellers

We doubled down on the most common theme “More product information” to see what features teammates have in mind and what features are on-demand

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From this point we were ready to jump into feature development. These are some features from the above list that we built and launched

35% – More product information. (Product availability, Reviews, recommendations, delivery information, product specs, etc)

Study 5. Teammate training

14% of teammates mentioned that they want more training, and 11% mentioned that they want more opportunities to learn from more experienced teammates. So we decided to deep dive into a training space. The goal of this study was to gain a baseline understanding of teammate behaviors around training, including pain points and training consumption.

Here are the most popular product training materials available at the moment:

• Product training videos
• Product Comparison guide
• Key items

Teammate to Teammate Interactions (TTI) appeared to be the most effective methods used today to evaluate and train Teammates on products

Most common TTI activities used today:

• Role play between TMs
• Shadowing more experienced TMs Coaching

Least effective were individual-based methods like e-learning, quizzes, etc.

Here are some other sentiments we’ve learned from this study:

It takes too much time to complete the product training – Appeared to be the biggest product training pain point

Learn by teaching others – Learning philosophy that we want to adopt for our product

Importance of training

You can find full research synthesis here

From this point, I generated some ideas about how we can boost teammates to teammate interaction. Here are some concepts that I proposed to the team.

Study 6. Personalization

Based on our previous study we can see that 9% of teammates would like to have more information about the athlete. We decided to deep dive into this topic to understand how personalization can help athletes and how it can affect shopping experience for customers.

What athlete personal information can help to teammates to provide personalized shopping experience:

1. Preferred brands
2. Preferred clothing and footwear size
3. Favorite sports/activities
4. Current athletic goals
5. Team colors
6. Favorite colors
7. How often athlete upgrades their sports gear
8. Sports leagues/communities athlete participate
9. Athlete’s name
10. Favorite sports teams

At what point of the shopping journey athletes feel the most comfortable sharing the data

What are the motivational factors for customers to share their personal information on a sales floor

Full study synthesis you can find here

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Proposed solutions