We’re back! Secondary research, DTC benchmarks, sticky add-to-cart
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Thank you for sponsoring our newsletter this week!
I’m back home after two months of deep rest. This concludes the first time I’ve paused these updates in ten years. I’m deeply grateful for your patience and hopeful that you will want to stick around for the ride. We’ve got a tremendously good year ahead of us.
On the business side, there is much to announce.
- Draft Teardown, our most popular offering, will be experiencing a price change at 5pm on March 18. If you want to get a teardown for the new year, now would be a good time.
- Draft Revise still has one slot open. We are looking to fill it for an April 15 kickoff.
- I launched something new, quietly, and the only way to find out is by texting me. Please do not try to find my phone number; I block unknowns anyway. If you already know me well, though, text me.
There is another thing to announce next week, but it’s not next week yet. Thanks again for reading, now and always, and for your patience & kindness as we navigated deep rest.
This week, for paid members
We’ve been keeping the paid community alive & thriving for the past two months, providing weekly lessons, fortnightly teardowns, monthly deep-dives, 1-on-1 strategy sessions, and office hours.
On top of all that, this past week included:
- Our paid lesson is all how trust changes when you move your add-to-cart button into a fixed footer.
- Our design of the week is all about some of the most fascinating home page social proof that we’ve yet seen.
- And our fortnightly teardown is for Thrive Market, a popular subscription box for the Whole Foods set.
Want in? Join us now – now named one of the best ecommerce communities going on the web.
Links & analysis
- We don’t talk enough around here about the role of secondary research in design decisions. NN/g does. I think one of the challenges in secondary research is that direct competitors often have completely different paths & strategies, and so secondary research doesn’t really hold water. Market research could help, since it would work to clarify demographic details for recruitment purposes. But there is really no substitute for talking directly with the people who actually want to pay you.
- The role of archetype in the design process. We look at archetypes rather than personas at Draft, since specific traits matter more than invented people.
- Someone who is smarter, more experienced, and more accomplished than me thinks agile is why design doesn’t support its young. Whatever the reason, it’s a major structural problem that has no real solution. The truly wild thing is that design is both terrible for juniors and ageist. Gosh, how does that one work?
- It’s Nice That asks if design is too trendy… with a post that feels very trendy. Popular design is trendy. Good design is not trendy. It embraces the familiar to make technology easier & more intuitive. That’s it, send tweet.
- Baymard posts 5 key UX benchmarks for DTC brands. My big takeaway is that customer objections are extremely high for new-to-them brands – and almost every DTC brand is new to the vast majority of consumers. Prove why you’re special and worthy of someone’s money. And do it fast, on the home page.
- Colors.
This week’s paid lesson: What are the trustworthiness ramifications of a sticky add-to-cart footer?
This week’s lesson is for paid members. Sign into our community to read it, or join us today to get access.
Thanks for the sponsorship, Tradeswell!
Say goodbye to spreadsheets 🎉 Tradeswell’s AI-powered, all-in-one platform automates the collection and analysis of your most important data across DTC, marketplace and advertising channels and provides real time insights for optimizing your ecommerce revenue and profits. Learn More.