For the past few months, we've been hard at work redesigning and building Supply a custom site on Shopify. Everything from strategy to copy to UX design and custom development was done by our team.
Supply was chosen as the recipient of the 2019 Fuel Made Grant for Growth, and soon after we launched their new site in October, they appeared on ABC’s hit show Shark Tank. (Spoiler alert: they got a deal with Robert Herjavec! $300,000 in exchange for 15% equity!)
Supply pitched their premium Single Edge Razor, along with the rest of their men’s grooming products, to the Sharks. Check out the Sharks battle it out below:
As any brand who has appeared on the show knows, preparing for Shark Tank is a full-time job on its own. Appearing before ~5 million viewers is a huge opportunity for any business, and online stores have to really think ahead to ensure they’re prepared for the influx of traffic.
While appearing on Shark Tank was not the reason behind Supply’s redesign, the timing aligned for us to help prepare them for their Shark Tank appearance.
We wrote about our journey designing and building Supply’s new website from the ground up. From strategy to branding to homepage design, we chat about our process and the decisions behind every step in the project.
Take a look below for a summary of each milestone. Or, head to the link for an in-depth analysis of each section.
- Let’s talk about the Fuel Made Growth Model
- Creating an ecommerce growth strategy
- Brand Voice: Where the Magic Happens
- Case study: How to turn a good homepage into a great one
- The anatomy of a great product page
Let’s talk about the Fuel Made Growth Model
The Fuel Made Growth Model is what takes our clients to the next level.
Our Growth Model is the blueprint and lifeline for seeding growth. This looks like:
- improved conversion rates, particularly for new visitors
- decreased bounce rates, and
- improved page speed.
This method is based on years of experience working with top digital brands. Working with these growing brands has taught us a lot about what works, and what doesn't.
In developing our growth model, we took a step back to evaluate our strongest growing brands and noticed a broader pattern amongst them. The simple pattern we identified?
Growing ecommerce brands relentlessly execute on optimizing the customer experience.
If you want to be able to charge more, retain longer, spread faster, and just have more fun, focus the way you do business around optimizing the customer experience.
Read more about our growth model here.
Creating an ecommerce growth strategy
Whenever we start a new project here at Fuel Made, our first step is always crafting an ecommerce growth strategy. It informs every decision we make.
While data is a guiding force for many growing ecommerce brands, strategy digs deeper than data alone. To create a growth strategy, we zone in on these key questions:
- What are their ecommerce goals?
- What does the data tell us about how customers currently interact with their store?
- How do we bridge the gap of where they are right now and where they want to go?
By the end, we’ve created a plan of action to solve the problems we identified through data and user behaviour. We have defined top opportunities for growth, so we’re able to keep a clear focus and direction as we move into visual design.
To learn more about our approach on strategy, head on over here.
Brand Voice: Where the Magic Happens
Voice exploration is first about:
- defining who you are,
- before you can plan what to say (content),
- and how to say it (tone).
When done well, and with great care, the result is a cohesive customer experience, from a homepage headline to a support email. When you know who you are, your customers can, too.
When we engage in voice and copy work at Fuel Made, we expect to be able to connect each piece of content back to our previously defined voice principles. We check each phrase and paragraph, every chat message and Facebook comment, against these principles. Because consistent alignment and a cohesive voice make for an excellent customer experience, and that’s where the magic growth happens.
You can learn more about brand voice exploration here.
Case study: How to turn a good homepage into a great one
In any design project, the homepage reveal is usually the most anticipated. It’s the first visual synthesis of all the work of strategy, discovery, wireframing, and style guides, put together into one tangible, meaningful deliverable.
When we look at Supply’s data, the homepage accounts for less than 20% of traffic. From that number, more than 60% are coming from social media channels, which generally bring more top-of-funnel visitors. So these tend to be visitors who are interested in learning more about a brand, and may not be quite ready to make a purchase. The approach we recommend in this case is to target the homepage to this top-of-funnel group (those with more purchase intent can still use the navigation and get where they need to go).
With this in mind, a key change we made was to strip down Supply’s homepage to shy away from product specifics, and speak more to selling the benefits of the product, who Supply is, what they stand for, and of course why you should buy from them.
Learn all about the changes we made, and why we made them here.
The anatomy of a great product page
The product detail page is the backbone to any digital store - it’s where the sales happen. While many clients view the homepage as the most impactful page on their site, data shows many shoppers begin their sessions on the product detail page, or PDP.
This key page has many important elements attached to it. It needs to introduce. It needs to educate. But most importantly, it needs to convince.
Since there is so much information that needs to be communicated on this page, we need a thoughtful strategy in place. Otherwise it can overwhelm the shopper. The goal of a PDP design is to present visitors with enough information to make a decision, but not too much that is distracts from the sale.
Want to learn about the thinking behind Supply’s new PDP? Head on over here.
Since Supply's launch, we've been keeping close track of their data to monitor impact. Head on over here to see how their new site is performing. (Spoiler: their conversion rate has increased by 50%!)
