Curbside pickup
Objectives:
Keep Home Depot customers safe during the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Seamlessly guide mobile app users from home to store to retrieve Curbside Pickup orders.
The project
Main stakeholders: product manager, UX architect, several UX designers, UX researcher, developers, and the Home Depot store-ops team
My role: lead content strategist, writing content for the entire experience
Challenges:
Writing/designing to keep customers safe from exposure to COVID-19 added a new meaning to “user empathy”
This project was urgent; we worked on a 3-month timeline
Creating consistency between digital shopping and the store experience
Timeline: March - June 2020
The strategy
Basic process: User interviews > Competitive analysis > Architecture > User testing > Hi-fi prototypes > User testing > Launch
Content notes:
The most important thing here was to make this experience “at a glance.” Customers may glance at their phone while in a rush, driving to the store, or trying to find a parking spot. Giving the clearest instructions possible at the exact right time was top of mind.
Stores were able to prepare orders more quickly when we could share customers’ locations with them, which required asking some customers for their geolocation. Asking for sensitive information is best done in context, so it was important to emphasize the purpose and benefit of the ask.
To communicate what customers could expect at the store, it was crucial to figure out where the store Curbside Pickup areas would be and what the signs would look like. We collaborated with the store-ops team to make sure the digital and physical experience reflected the other.
User-based iterations:
Overall, our due diligence and research paid off, and customers navigated to the store without much effort
We did receive feedback that some customers weren’t able to find Curbside parking at the stores, which made them frustrated. As a solution, I wrote the copy “Can’t find a spot?”, which would guide customers to park near the front of the store and turn on their blinkers.
Error messages and push notifications
Because Curbside hours were slightly shorter than regular store hours, this error message was necessary.
Clearly stating the hours and giving a secondary pickup option were the best ways to help customers get their orders.
The best error messages give specific guidance to help users forward. But for inexplicable technical issues, that gets tricky.
Here, the most helpful thing was to direct customers to contact their store.
To announce Curbside Pickup’s release to app users, I wrote this lighthearted push notification.
Results
Success! Measured by:
Positive feedback from happy customers.
Over 1M Curbside Pickup check-ins via the app experience.
The $1B in revenue the experience supported in its first year after launch.
The satisfaction gained. Knowing we helped ease our customers’ anxiety– even just a bit– was priceless.
