Case study: nike.com’s customer support page redesign
Project developed for Aela’s Master Interface Design course
Briefing
The goal of this project was to study, analyze and develop an improved web customer support page for a well-known brand active in the market, in order to provide an overall better, easier, and faster user experience throughout the interface. The result should be a non-responsive desktop-based web page design.
NIKE
Just Do It
Hard to find someone who has never heard of that weird, short, and catchy set of letters that seem to be as unforgettable as your own home address. Whether it’s on a billboard on your way to work, on a magazine you read while waiting for your dentist’s appointment, or on Tom Hank’s feet in the epic romantic comedy-drama movie Forrest Gump, chances are you’ve at least seen that famous “swoosh” stamped somewhere.
Being one of the world’s largest supplier of athletic shoes and apparel and a major manufacturer of sports equipment, the American multinational has certainly lived up to the greek goddess of victory it’s named after and built its enormous empire throughout the years, establishing itself as one of the most valuable brands nowadays.
Founded in 1964 initially as Blue Ribbon Sports by Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight, NIKE has become a billion-dollar company engaged in designing, manufacturing, developing, and selling not only footwear, apparel, equipment, and accessories, but also a lifestyle.
If you have a body, you’re an athlete
NIKE’s mission is to “bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world.” And by an athlete, they don’t mean only the pro ones like soccer player Marta or swimmer Michael Phelps. They mean you, me, and anyone who has a body, because as Bill Bowerman once said, “If you have a body, you’re an athlete.”
Their purpose is to “unite the world through sport to create a healthy planet, active communities and an equal playing field for all”, and the way they do that is by embracing diversity, fostering an inclusive and equal culture inside and outside the company, and by taking sustainable actions to protect the future of our planet.
If there is no planet, there is no sport
That’s NIKE’s north star for sustainability since without a healthy planet we won’t be able to have healthy athletes for long. Driven by this belief, the company is constantly scaling its use of sustainable materials, like with the Grind program for example, where factory floor materials are reused and incorporated in new designs throughout NIKE’s catalog.
The multinational has also worked on their Reuse-A-Shoe program, a program that benefits both the environment and the community by recycling old athletic shoes. The material produced is then used to build new areas, such as basketball courts, running tracks, and playgrounds.
By building a more circular future, NIKE is designing and collaborating to preserve our planet and establishing itself as one of the top climate-friendly companies nowadays.
Goals
No, not the soccer kind
As with all publicly traded companies, NIKE’s first objective is to make a profit for the shareholders. That’s just how it goes. However, in order to meet this objective, we can identify that the company has a number of smaller objectives that help sustain its own beliefs.
So, NIKE also aims to design products that help athletes of every level of ability expand their human potential; thrive both consumers and the company in a sustainable economy where people, profit, and planet are in balance; and reduce waste and strengthen communities. All this creates business opportunities that set NIKE apart from the competition, providing value for their shareholders.
Alright, immersed as we are in the way NIKE operates, let’s understand a little bit more about who NIKE’s customers are, besides Forrest Gump.
Everything we do starts with the consumer
Is what CEO Mark Parker said. NIKE is hyper-focused on their customers. Why? Because they know their future depends on a strong relationship between business and people. Customer preferences and tastes are always changing, which means NIKE needs to be constantly disrupting itself and reinventing its business model. Innovation is happening too fast to sit still and NIKE is still looking to win with its product, but it’s now looking to elevate its brand based on service and offer a superior customer experience than its competitors.
Like with 2020’s scenario, for example. Even with stores closing all around the world due to the pandemic, NIKE saw its digital sales jump 82% in the first quarter, coming to represent nearly a third of its total business profit. “Digital is fueling how we create the future of retail”, CEO John Donahoe said, “The consumer today is digitally grounded and simply will not revert back.”
Nowadays, it’s critical that the purpose and values of a brand are aligned with the values of its customers. And it’s not a matter of chicken or egg and what came first, it’s the need for brand values to evolve with their customer values, adapting itself to their needs, pains, and the context in which they’re established.
Where all athletes belong
NIKE has been a powerhouse for decades now and it’s interesting to see how they’ve shaped their business model throughout the years. Currently, the company’s target markets are consumers ages 15–45, distributed between three major identifiable categories:
- ATHLETES
Yes, “If you have a body, you’re an athlete”, but we’re talking here about a more high-performance group of people that seek NIKE for premium quality athletic gear in order to develop their full athletic potential. Of course, NIKE wants to target the majority of people as well by offering a wide range of gear for anyone wanting to improve their athletic pose, however, a big market for the company are the ones looking for high-quality and performance-focused products.
- WOMEN
The women’s apparel division has boosted nearly 200% throughout the late years, adding billions of dollars of profit to the company. NIKE saw this as a great opportunity to really focus and build a strong relationship with women, inside and outside the sports panorama. And since fostering an equal playing field for all is one of NIKE’s prime values, they’re committed to create an inclusive culture and break down barriers of all kinds. A big step was sponsoring the 2019 Women’s World Cup, stating that in fact, you need to take a look around you and keep up with the times.
- YOUNG ATHLETES
In order to ensure future growth, young athletes are also a big part of NIKE’s target market. Through personal use or sponsorships, the company saw it as a great opportunity to draw in young customers and build long-term brand loyalty.
Now that we already have a north star about who NIKE’s supposed most prominent consumers are, let’s dive into some research regarding the customer service in question and what the e-commerce users' possible needs, pains, and objectives are as they seek support from the company.
Customer Support
Some pains can’t be healed with simple ointment
Since this project aims to better understand NIKE’s support page, an overall customer complaints research was needed, in order to possibly identify their biggest needs and pains while seeking help. Complaints boards/sites from all over the world were analyzed and some interesting points came up:
- DELIVERY
Whether “late”, “never came” or “yes, it did arrive but wasn’t the one I ordered”, a vast majority of customers were complaining about their order deliveries. Problems related appeared in every single one of the sites analyzed, suggesting that it might be one of the key pain points for users.
- ORDER PROCESS
Difficulties with placing orders, waiting for confirmation, and/or unexpected/unexplained cancelation were also very present, leaving customers feeling frustrated and lost, not understanding what went wrong and how they could revert that state.
- REFUND
Possibly one of the major ones as well, problems with refunds were very prominent throughout the analysis. The frustration of still waiting to get their money back and not receiving proper information from the support team, in addition to what some of them described as a “feeling of getting robbed”, indicates that it might be a serious pain point in the relationship between NIKE and it’s customers.
- PRODUCT PROBLEMS
When buying something brand new from a top market brand, you’d expect it to be 110% perfect, especially if you’re someone looking for high-performance athletic gear. Well, that’s what all the customers expected as well, but since the boards were also filled with people complaining about the not-110%-quality of the products they received, problems regarding defects/poor quality also made the list. In addition to being possibly a literal pain point for the ones actually using the products, NIKE’s high values of apparel quality are also hurt.
- BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE
The difficulty of properly being able to contact and receive help from NIKE’s customer service through the customer’s support page, let’s be honest, is bad. Some complained about not getting e-mail responses, chats not working, phones that kept ringing, and staff not knowing how they could provide further help. And since customers reach out for support in order to solve their problems regarding the delivery, order process, refund, and/or product problems, improving overall customer service through the interface might be the biggest problem to solve.
DEFINITION PHASE
Understanding that all the data collected and analyzed previously could be a little overwhelming and challenging to translate into something meaningful and useful for NIKE’s customer support page, I decided to shape a couple of personas and their journeys through the website’s interface when trying to solve a problem they’re having, in order to get a better sense and definition of the key points this project will aim to solve and who are the ones most affected by them, leading to possibly a better user experience in the end.
Personas
NIKE’s possibly largest target markets were already pretty clear (athletes, women, young athletes), however for us to really empathize and understand a user’s perspective about this online experience of purchasing and contacting customer service, I translated that broad data into these personas. Assuming and embracing the hypothesis that the “young athletes” segment of customers wasn’t as significant (in terms of online shopping and customer support) as the other two segments, for this project I decided to create only 02 personas representing the other target markets. Meet Willow and Josh.
Customer Journey Map
With Willow and Josh as our protagonists, I created a hypothetical customer journey scenario through NIKE’s customer support webpage (https://www.nike.com/help), based on the review's analysis done previously in order to possibly better identify pain points and opportunities from a users point of view.
Problem Definition
Willow and Josh are characters, but they represent NIKE’s real users, who have real problems, needs, and goals while using the company’s customer support page. Based on the personas, their hypothetical journeys, and pain points, I had a solid base to possibly identify what the real problems were and what solutions I could propose in order to build a better, stronger bridge between NIKE and its customers.
So, what problems seem to be the most prominent ones?
- Difficulties in contacting customer service, whether through phone number, chat, or e-mail (due to numerous reasons possible);
- Lack of efficiency and autonomy for users in finding answers to problems they are having;
- Not being able to identify what solution tools are at their disposal to manage the problems they are having;
To see or not to see
That is the question
And why are those even problems to begin with? Let’s dive into that.
This is NIKE’s main customer support page. One of the biggest complaints was regarding overall customer service contact through the website itself. We can see that NIKE has a bunch of contacts listed on the page, did you notice where the company’s chat channel is? It’s right here.
By clicking on it, the chatbox opens up in a new page and NIKE’s virtual assistant pops up.
First, the struggle to find it. Second, for this chatbox to load it takes a looong time, possibly due to intense online traffic and an overloaded system. So, imagine users in a hurry during their lunch break trying to get help with an order issue they’re having searching for direct contact with customer service, and being left on hold for so long they eventually just give up because they simply do not have the time (and patience) anymore. Doesn’t sound that good, does it?
- How can we ensure faster and easier access to customer support through the interface in order to provide reliability and conquer user’s confidence?
In addition, we have complaints regarding the lack of efficiency while users try to find answers on their own, not being able to quickly identify solutions at their disposal that could give them the control in managing their own problems. Why could that be? Possibly because there isn’t a clear visual hierarchy of information that could optimize the overall experience, providing easy access to the most important sections on the webpage and prioritizing the user’s domain.
- How can we guarantee efficiency throughout the interface, prioritizing information and optimizing the overall time and effort in order to provide a better user experience?
In order to ensure an overall improved holistic experience for NIKE’s customer support page users and ensure their trust, confidence, and loyalty to the brand, those 02 specific “how can we” points are the ones we’re focusing on at the moment.
Let’s do it then.
IDEATION PHASE
Breaking barriers of all kind, including cognitive ones
With the main problems stated, it’s time to develop possible solutions for the overall interface of https://www.nike.com/help. Aiming to hit all the goals of improvement, I made a checklist of targets that could fulfill the user’s most urgent needs at the time:
- Chatbox highlight and call-to-action, to ensure faster and direct contact with NIKE’s customer service help;
- Hierarchy of information, prioritizing what users search for the most;
- Categories and sections of information, to provide organization throughout;
- Identification of what’s clickable (and what isn’t);
- Consistent iconography, color palette, and typography hierarchy;
- Clarity > Efficiency > Consistency > Beauty, but making sure to hit all of the four;
- Communicate the interface in a more human and friendly way with the user;
- Maintain the search bar highlighted and visible;
Benchmarking
In order to analyze what other similar companies were up to and how they handled and developed their main customer support interface for users, I opted to realize a quick competitive and visual benchmarking study to establish how we could elevate NIKE’s own platform in comparison.
Adidas:
Puma:
Under Armour:
Footlocker:
Wireframes
With all the problems, goals, and analysis in mind, I drafted some ideas around which led to the following 02 proposed wireframes versions for NIKE’s overall customer support page information architecture.
Option 01:
Option 02:
Having in mind the goals of providing easy access, efficiency, priorization of information, and an overall optimized interface for the users, I opted to utilize the wireframe option number 02 as the base for the prototypation of NIKE’s customer support page, understanding that it better coincided with what we are trying to accomplish at the moment.
Mood Board
Now, in order to get a really good sense of how we could apply the visual elements to the interface’s design, I created a mood board capturing how NIKE itself works with colors, textures, and contrasts throughout its catalog and how they make sure that exactly the right elements pop out, for example. Since NIKE has a very minimalistic and neutral visual design working on their webpage, this was the chosen color base palette, with hints and pops of warm tones.
Prototype
And finally, here is the final result of the prototype for NIKE’s redesigned and improved customer service webpage proposition.
I believe it is safe to say that our checklist looks like this so far:
☑ Chatbox highlight and call-to-action, to ensure faster and direct contact with NIKE’s customer service help;
☑ Hierarchy of information, prioritizing what users search for the most;
☑ Categories and sections of information, to provide organization throughout;
☑ Identification of what’s clickable (and what isn’t);
☑ Consistent iconography, color palette, and typography hierarchy;
☑ Clarity > Efficiency > Consistency > Beauty, but making sure to hit all of the four;
☑ Communicate the interface in a more human and friendly way with the user;
☑ Maintain the search bar highlighted and visible;
Check out the interactive prototype right here:
Finish Line
For now…
This was a major first UX/UI project experience for me. A while back I didn’t think I could work on such a deep level of research and documentation, much less producing actual results that could actually help people with their needs. I am very grateful to my mentor and to the whole Aela team for all the help and knowledge I’ve been given so far.
But we all know that this is not actually the finish line. Restless reinvention, continuous testing, and ongoing learning are essential in order to improve not only the solutions we came up with but ourselves as well.
Hope you’ve enjoyed it and if you’d like to join me on my journey across the (now a bit more familiar) seas of User Experience and User Interface Design, I invite you to follow me on my website and social media accounts :)
Aela — Editorial Aela.io — https://medium.com/aela — aela.io
