Peapod.com Online Shopper Experience Analysis
Peapod is a famous online grocery platform that is well known to U.S families. The company joined the ecommerce business and launched its own website, www.peapod.com in 1996. Like all “brick and mortar” grocery stores, Peapod provides thousands of products online. They also have their own private brands called Stop & Shop and Giant. Although papod.com has enjoyed great success over the past few years, the online grocery industry is still very competitive. In order to win in the long term, Peapod needs to enhance its online shopping experience.
Considering how the “point-to-point clickstream of online shoppers is similar to the experience of visiting, shopping, and purchasing in a physical store, I am going to analyze the current active retail experience on Peapod based on the active shopping experience combine with 3 shopper currenies (Time, Money, Angst)，and provide some suggestions in the next step.
Active shopping is the customer who purchases the product without any assistance. The supermarket-shopping model is an excellent example of this concept. In the following article, I am going to lead you step-by-step to experience shopping on peapod.com.
Getting started: The interface for login/registration is really convenient. You can either set up a new account, or use your current social media account to enter the website. Like the entrance of physical grocery stores, the design is important to draw people in, so they can begin their shopping trips. However, unlike looking through a grocery store window, you cannot view any products or offers before you log in.
Begin your shopping trip: After login, you are taken to the main page. There are four areas there—the top module tags, the left-side navigators, the right-side shopping cart and the middle information banners. The left-side navigator will lead you to the different categories; the right-side will show what is in the shopping cart and how much you have currently spent. The top module tags provide access to different functions, such as Express shopping, Browsers Aisles, Special Offers, and Recipes. The middle information banners provide promotions, advertising, and important announcements.
From a customer standpoint, the “shopping cart” design is quite useful, as it transparently shows items currently in my basket. This allows me to keep track of the items I am buying, as well as control my overall budget. However, the downside of this design is that it will make customers take more time before check-out by considering whether all products in the cart are really needed. In addition to the design of the shopping cart, the left-side banner and the head tags are also a bit confusing regarding where to start from, especially for a new customer. This is no doubt bringing up the “angst” emotion from the customer.
Start purchase: The design on the “Express shop” tag connecting with “Recipes and More” tag is really smart. For example, if you find any favorite recipes provided by peapod, there will be an option to add all of the required items by using “Express shop.” In this way, customers will probably buy more items without awareness. What’s more, the Express shop function enables shoppers to paste their shopping list directly into the blank. For those “quick trip, fill in” shoppers, this function is really helpful, considering the time savings. However, putting the Express shop tag in front of the Browser Aisles in the main page will definitely distract those “stock-up” customers’ attention.
The interface on the browser aisles is clear. Shoppers can navigate the types of products in different departments. The website also provides the function “unit price compare,” which can save shoppers time.
The “Recipe and More” module, if it were better designed, could be a wonderful channel to lead shoppers to buy more items that were not on their list. However, the current page is really hard to navigate, since the website puts both the “special recipes” and the “core recipe” buttons together without any color or design distinctions. The shoppers will not be likely to take the additional time to investigate once they have become confused by clicking the wrong button.
The flowing screen shot illustrates this problem.
Savings and coupons application: Every shopper wants to pay less, and get more. Peapod recognizes is and provides a coupon printing function on the website. However, the coupons are impossible to print unless you install and additional program. It also seems impossible to apply the coupon automatically during the shopping experience.
Check out (The final MOT): Considering the final MOT, the check-out interface is really important. Based on their current business model, peapod provides both delivery and pick-up service. There is a minimum order size, and delivery service is not free. The delivery fee will be less when your total purchase price is above a specific threshold. (The minimum order size is $60, and the smallest delivery fee is $6.97, when the order is more than $100.) Needless to say, this is a great barrier to those who cannot meet the minimum requirements; especially for quick shoppers who do not have many items to purchase at one time.
The website also provides another service called “value days.” It is a schedule shipping option to help customers save money. There are also some other options, like “ETA, GREEN, UNATTENDED” whose meaning is unclear without following a sub-link. This is no doubt confusing to shoppers, and forces them to take a longer time to finish their shopping.
Summary on the overall shopping experience:
As discussed, there are three currencies of shopping: money, time and angst. Considering that shoppers are expected to manage their own shopping experience online, it is better to understand whether all the information is clear enough, where shoppers are spending their time, and how we can make them quickly proceed to final check out. Which is to say, simply attempting to increase shopper time online is useless.
On Peapod’s website, the “Express shop” and transparent shopping cart designs can both enhance the currency on efficiency. To the money saving points, the “unit price” feature and coupon applying are good initiatives. To the minimum angst emotion, the process needs to be less confusing, and lead more directly to the final purchase process. In Peapod’s case, the navigator and segment tags in the first page together with the check-out process should be re- designed.
