Zola Albums
Levering the power of market research, a combination of software and e-commerce patterns, and a targeted user research strategy to design for user and business pain points, deliver a world class album builder tool, and producing immediate results.
47% increase
in the rate of album drafts that convert to an order
86% increase
in the number of users who complete & order their album within 24 hours of starting a draft
Overview
Founded by two frustrated wedding guests - Zola.com began as an integrated registry site allowing couples to create a custom registry site; allowing wedding guests to shop a single registry, across multiple stores, all in one place. Since its conception in 2013, Zola has since expanded well beyond registry services and has grown into a full, web-based wedding planning platform.
The Zola experience now includes everything from free wedding websites, vendor discovery, and wedding management tools such as a guest address collector and digital seating chart. Aside from specializing in wedding planning, Zola has become a wedding e-commerce giant - selling everything from invitations, wedding bands, and, most recently, custom wedding albums.
The Problem
Shortly after launching the initial version of the album builder, it became clear there were several major customer and business pain points - including the product costing the company money. Issues arose relating to everything from order conversion, holes in the overall user flow, and the implemented tech not being up to par. Users were dropping off early in the album customization process and the product pitfalls resulted in tons of support tickets, store credits, and even full refunds.
Problem Details
High Drop-off Rate
Why were couples dropping off immediately after uploading photos and before even diving in to customization?
Issues with Order Conversion
Why were couples who did upload photos and begin customization taking so long to complete the process and order an album?
Lack of Positive Insights
What WAS working? And why did the first user who placed the first album sale order decide to do so and what did she like/dislike about the process?
Costing the Company Money
The usability pitfalls of the original album tool resulted in a ton of support tickets, credits, an even full refunds.
THE SOLUTION
WALKTHROUGH
Design Driven Outcomes
Designs that spoke to users, outcomes that speak for themselves.
Less Confusion Surrounding Album Options
Adding guidance via social proof callouts and more details surrounding how edits (such as additional pages and changes in material selections) impacted pricing resulted in couples feeling more empowered to make decisions faster and build an album that fit within their budget.
Decrease In Creation to Order Time
Working with development to improve the Album Builder Tool by researching improved auto-photo cropping APIs, reworking the uploaded photo organization tool, and giving couples the ability to edit album style and layout without exiting the Album Builder Tool allowed couples to complete albums faster.
More Album Orders Submitted
Redesigning the album review workflow to include multiple confirmations, an improved album preview, and the ability to easily go back and make changes prior to ordering resulted in more couples getting to the checkout flow and placing an order in significantly less time.
A Best-In-Class Solution
Not only did the UX/UI improvements increase album sales almost instantaneously, they also addressed major pain points and technical deficiencies the team noted in our competitor research, making Zola Albums a best-in-class option for album creation of any kind.
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More details surrounding user research, feature prioritization, and usability testing are coming soon...
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