Dan Siroker's Blog

There’s a lot happening in the community at Optimizely.  

The Optimizely community continues to grow and our community slack now counts over 2800 members, with new professionals joining daily. 

The Optimizely MVPs (a group of 70+ technical community contributors) have been busy writing code packages, how-to guides, and blog posts to help technical users get the most out of Optimizely products.  

Today we’re excited to welcome 11 extraordinarily helpful community members to the prestigious MVP group! The Optimizely MVPs enjoy benefits exclusive to them including early access to new products & features, an audience with Optimizely leadership for feedback, and in person parties/events and swag!  

 

The New MVPs 

Site Implementation + Digital Strategy 

Alex Boesen – Alm Brand 

Chris Sharp – BlueBolt 

Elizabeth Spranzani – Verndale 

Eric Markson – Perficient 

Himadri Chakrabarti – Nishtech Inc. 

Jacob Pretorius – Zone 

Joe Post – Adage 

Sanjay Kumar – Rightpoint 

Santiago Morla – Verndale 

 

Optimization 

Sean Hughes – Kin + Carta 

Simon Born – real.digital 

 

While the MVP program started out focusing on developers sharing technical blogs and code, the program was expanded in early 2017 to also include Digital Strategists. Today we recognize technical users across our product disciplines. The basic requirements for all Optimizely MVPs are the same as for developer MVPs – to share and inspire others. 

If you know someone you think should be an MVP, go ahead and nominate them or send them the link to apply directly.

Keep up with all Optimizely MVP activities by following our official twitter account and the MVP operated Instagram account! 

The post Welcome! Celebrating our newest Optimizely Most Valuable Professionals! 🎉  first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

As Optimizely has grown over the past two years, through acquisition and organically, our product organization has grown 300%. With this growth, we created new groups, added new roles and reorganized to build an infrastructure to support product and services production.

How does all of this get managed? We needed leadership to build the product team to a more “grown-up” organization, keeping to the high standard of product output our customers and partners are used to.

During this evolution, we realized that, to keep progressing, we cannot lose focus on the critical collaboration across departments and functions including product, engineering, product marketing, design and more. This resulted in the formation of my current role, Global VP of Product Operations. As a trusted advisor to our chief product officer, Justin Anovick, my goal is to help the product team operate in the most efficient and effective way through improved communication, collaboration, streamlined processes and programs measured through high quality results.

I’m six months into this challenge and loving it! The qualities and characteristics needed to manage product operations fit well with my experience and personality. What I love most is the ability to identify and drive change that benefits our entire organization, resulting in better solutions for our customers and partners.

Identifying what needs to improve is easy… the change and improvements are the tough part. I started with three areas that needed immediate attention – I call them the three “C’s”:

Consistency
In order to operate efficiently, you need to have consistency with your meetings, templates, processes, deliverables, and resources. Your team needs to know that certain things are going to happen a certain way at a certain time. This helps everyone keep to deadlines and expectations.

A few key outcomes of this are:

Revised, repurposed and rescheduled meetings that help us plan and execute product strategy.Product Release and Roadmap templates, regular cadence for releases, and clear ownership.Regular cadence and repeatable processes across product clouds for all departments.Collaboration
My goals were to improve teamwork within the product organization; and to connect teams and work streams that otherwise would remain autonomous. Our improved collaboration started with two main interactions: I had one-on-one meetings with each member of the product leadership team to understand their challenges and ideas; I also connected all leads across departments including: product management, product strategy, design, product marketing, and engineering to work together to prioritize ideas and execution. These meetings continue monthly to introduce new concepts, understand challenges and suggestions coming from the teams.

Collaboration was enhanced by implementing a few resources to help teams, including:

Cross-departmental, cloud (product)-specific team lists – this has been very helpful in understanding who is working on a product or module from ideation through execution, including PM Owners, Documentation managers, engineering leads, etc.Collecting feedback and aligning resources through forms. This is a simple process that allows users to quickly submit information and get a quick response, instead of emailing and waiting for answers.Communication
Communication can always be improved and is essential to keeping people informed and engaged. Communication needs to be as transparent as possible and bi-directional. A few areas where we have focused on improvements include:Standardizing on a single communication vehicle: Microsoft Teams. We use Teams for all company communication – to find information, collaborate on projects, chat, and more. It is necessary to build the muscle within your organization to consistently use the vehicle you choose to prioritize. If people are not using this consistently or prioritizing communication through this vehicle, it will not have an impact.Distributing a company-wide newsletter from the product team, which we’ve titled, “Product Matters.” This monthly newsletter consolidates all the important information that we have shared throughout the month, from each group within the product team, and is distributed to everyone in the company.Enhancing and improving our team meetings to drive value through information, education, recognition, and team bonding.Providing a one-stop-shop to find all things related to the product team. I rebuilt our Product Portal so that anyone in the organization can easily find information and resources.

Along with these initiatives, I also have the pleasure to work on strategic programs and projects. One of these very important programs that we re-launched in April are our customer advisory boards (CABs). The objective of the CABs is to enable Optimizely to gain strategic, market-based, and user-based feedback and guidance on product from key customers. We introduced four product cloud CABs with very positive feedback from initial meetings.

I am very proud of the work we have done as a cross-departmental team. We have seen how the improvements have driven change and efficiencies – resulting in Optimizely’s ability to get product ideas and enhancements out to customers and partners in a faster and more effective way. However, there is still work to do! Some of the projects I am currently working on include:

Data-driven reporting to enable decision-making on roadmap resources and initiatives.Expansion of operations to the engineering team to use similar best practices and processes.Product team hiring and onboarding.

Yes, we are hiring! If you’re interested in joining a first-in-class product organization, check out our job openings here and reach out to me.

The post Optimizely Transforms Product Organization to Support Maturing Product Set for Evolving Customer Needs first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

In March, we hosted the latest in our one-hour series of Digital Labs sessions for a global audience. Speakers from innovative brands FullStory, Zillow Group and The Financial Times provided actionable insights into creating a great tech stack and debated hot topics like Build vs Buy, the importance of cross-functional input when creating a tech stack and the most exciting trends on the horizon.

Missed it? Here’s what we covered.

First, meet the Panelists:

Jason Tabert, Senior Marketing Specialist, Conversion Rate Optimization, Zillow GroupIvan Hristov, Head of Product, The Financial TimesEd Barrow, VP Product Strategy, OptimizelyPatrick Brandt, Engineering Manager, Ecosystem, FullStoryCustomers are your North Star, so simplify their journey through technology, service and integration.

The event opened with Zillow outlining the complicated customer journey within the real estate digital landscape and how a smart tech stack can help simplify and optimize the customer experience. Zillow offers a breadth of different services and online customer journeys are often non-linear. Consumers expect “Push button, make magic happen”. However, real estate transactions are complicated, time consuming, stressful and expensive for the customer.

Zillow’s goal is to create a “radically simpler real estate transaction through our technology, our services, our integrations” and to help customers at every stage of their real estate journey.

Make your tech stack work hard for you.

Key considerations for Zillow when building out their tech stack were gaining insights into user behaviors and being able to message customers appropriately and consistently, reducing friction points along those customer journeys and facilitating transitions between different products.

Zillow has multiple product lines and they’re evolving their tech stack to support multiple lines of business, both B2C and B2B​. Passing data and information back and forth between the systems, being able to analyze the same cohorts and making sure you’re looking at the same people across systems enriches the whole program. Jason advocated companies should constantly re-evaluate their existing tech stack – is it still working for you? Is there something better?​

When building on your tech stack, always consider what existing tools you can integrate with and what kind of value you’ll get out of connecting these tools together. Jason advised buying the “best in class” tools to provide all those integrations. Passing data and information back and forth between tools and being able to analyze the same segments and audiences across systems enriches your customer profiles and helps future-proof your tech stack.

Zillow uses Optimizely as their experimentation and personalization platform, which sits on top of their WordPress installation. Zillow sends Optimizely data into Google Analytics, and then through other tools like FullStory, so they can understand more of the customer journey and do a deeper analysis into user behavior.

Zillow used their smart tech stack to help understand where users were perhaps languishing or abandoning the journey. As Jason explained, using a tool like FullStory, “You can segment and really dive into the customers who didn’t take that action that you were hoping for, or they didn’t convert.” In that way, you’re, “Understanding those customer journeys and watching those replays and looking at all those metrics where you’re not speaking to the user, where they go into a different page, where they’re looping. That all helps inform ways that you might be able to change your experiments, understand what they did instead, shift your messaging, lots of different things.”  Insights from tools like FullStory can be fed back into your experimentation program and you can constantly iterate and move forward. Jason’s final piece of advice was, “Don’t be afraid of a losing experiment, because even a loss tells you something.”

Build vs Buy? Start with defining your business case.

With so many great tech stack options and “best-in-class” platforms available, does it make sense to partner on technology or to build your own? Well, according to our panelists, a Build vs Buy decision is not just about technology; it needs to start with defining your desired outcome.

Ivan Hristov from The Financial Times said it always starts with the business case and the question, “What are you trying to achieve?” You then have to weigh up what internal resources are available to build something versus going to market and seeing what’s available. If it’s not a core part of your business, Ivan said he would always prefer to partner.

Jason Taubert from Zillow is also a proponent of buying where possible. Like Ivan, Jason believes if it’s not your core expertise then, “I think it’s always best to not reinvent the wheel and to go buy those ‘best in class’ tools.” He also acknowledged that you need to have the buy-in from stakeholders and suggested setting up light integrations as touchpoints where you can then prove out the value before committing to buying in the tool.

Patrick Brandt from FullStory highlighted the unexpected hidden costs and serious investment associated not only with building but maintaining a tool and keeping it running.  When it comes to a choice to build or buy, you have to consider whether you have the skills and expertise in-house to not only build but to sustain the tool yourself.

When designing a tech stack, bring together a cross-functional team with differing viewpoints.

Bringing together different disciplines to understand the bigger picture helps to ensure full scope visibility of what is being requested when considering how to build out your tech stack. As Jason said, “I think it’s important to bring together a lot of different disciplines…not just from the marketing side, for instance, or from the product side…so that you’re really understanding are we building something that’s actually going to enable all these different teams and really answering all those different problems.” It’s important to get a high-level view to ensure you’re actually building something that’s going to help stakeholders with their specific needs.

Ivan said there’s often under representation from data teams or they’re involved at too late a stage, so it’s essential to have cross functional representation from the outset. Their point of view is essential when designing a tech stack to ensure the business benefits.

Ed Barrow from Optimizely stated the 80/20 rule and advised, “Spending 80% of your time really trying to understand and articulate the problem. A lot of that comes from business users and the business teams, but also from the data teams and engineering teams about the common state of affairs and just really being clear about the problem that we’re trying to solve. The scale of that challenge puts into perspective the investments and the decisions that then get made.”

Don’t just evaluate the tool itself but how that tool will fit into your existing stack.

Often within companies, there are many different platforms/tools in place working in silos. How do companies map out and build integrations between those tools and optimize their value? Well, Patrick Brandt from FullStory said it starts with a data-centric view – understanding the value that any given tool provides in isolation but also understanding how a particular tool lives within a business process and how it impacts workflows. The next step is to understand those data flows and specifically how any of that can be managed via API’s (application programming interfaces) to gain insights in a cost-effective and easy manner.

It’s about “focusing on the outputs that make the most sense so you’re thinking about the whole story. As an example, Optimizely has this great capability to output any variation that a user experiences at any given time through their API. We have the ability, through our API, to take that into FullStory.”

Jason agreed that the question of integration is critical before bringing in new tools and is yet another reason to bring a multi-disciplinary team together to ensure you map out integrations across your entire ecosystem. There are a lot of duplicative tools so standardizing across tools really helps. It’s important to not just evaluate the tool itself but to consider the flow of data through the whole ecosystem to help you achieve your objectives, not just now, but in the future.

Ed Barrow of Optimizely echoed Jason’s keynote presentation when he stressed the importance of common identifiers between tools so that they’re talking the same language. This gives companies a lot of flexibility down the line as the way you envisage integrating two systems today, “Isn’t going to be fit for purpose in 18 months to 24 months’ time.” It’s important to recognize that business is always evolving and to ensure that you can improve and adapt integrations over time, “So that you have the ability to pull data from somewhere, manipulate it and send it on somewhere else, giving you much more flexibility and making sure that you’re building for change.”

Two major tech stack trends on the horizon.

The use of customer data platforms (CDPs) will be a key trend according to Ed Barrow, as companies seek to reach into other platforms in a flexible way and leverage that data to tailor the user experience. Ed announced Optimizely’s recent acquisition of a customer data platform called Zaius, which will be embedded into Optimizely’s digital experience platform so companies can leverage a broader base of data across multiple systems to personalize the customer experience.

Patrick said that the one big mega trend they’re watching at FullStory is the continued shift to digitization across industries. “It’s easy to take for granted how pervasive ecommerce is, yet it continues to be adopted more and more broadly”. COVID-19 has accelerated the mobile enablement of ecommerce, so it’s important to consider the user journey regardless of the channel used.

Collaborative tools will become “must-have” elements of your tech stack, as remote working is here to stay.

Echoing Ed’s comments, Ivan from The Financial Times said that, from a B2C perspective, a CDP is critical for them to have a 360-degree view of the customer and the various touchpoints of the customer journey across multiple channels. A CDP tool offers a lot of value and potential for their business in terms of being able to plug in data from different places to understand customer behavior and to activate successful customer engagement tactics.

Patrick believes that integration platforms like Zapier and Ricotta are now essential to businesses. “What I love about these platforms is that it’s basically a low code or no code way to connect the data flows between disparate tools.” They allow mutual customers to snap together different tools like FullStory notification alerts and Slack or landing data from one platform into a CDP or data analysis platform in a very user-friendly way that doesn’t require an engineering skill set.

Ed believes that, with the shift to remote working, it’s important for companies to invest in OKR management to allow large, distributed teams to collaborate effectively. “I’m really interested in more asynchronous ways of organizing and managing teams and I think there’s been a very rapid rise of OKR management and other tools that enable organizations to align everyone around a shared set of goals, to provide transparency across teams, so you know what’s going on in other departments and how your contributions add up to the overall goals of the company.”

Thanks as ever to all of you who attended the third session in our new Digital Labs Series, dedicated to helping you build your own smart tech stack.

More sessions are on the way featuring panelists from some seriously great brands. They’ll be discussing various aspects of the smart tech stack, all backed up by real-world insights based on their own experiences.

If you haven’t signed up for the series, you’re welcome to join us: Sign up for Digital Labs

Author: Carina Conaghan

Title: Director Global Technology Partnerships

Carina Conaghan, Director Global Technology Partnerships, is based in Optimizely’s London office. Joining Optimizely in 2015, she leads Global Technology Partner Strategy. She is responsible for the development, operation, and monetisation of Optimizely’s Technology Partner Program.

The post 6 tech stack insights from FullStory, Zillow Group and The Financial Times first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

Experimentation is an essential part of any company’s digital experience strategy. Optimizely is the world’s leading experimentation platform, empowering marketing and product teams to test, learn and deploy winning digital experiences. By running experiments and measuring the impact of new features, campaigns and content with real users in production, teams can ensure they deliver valuable new digital experiences more quickly and with less risk.  

It can be challenging, however, to know which experiments you should prioritize in order to drive the most impactful improvements to the customer experience and digital conversions. And, once you’ve run an experiment, it’s not always obvious why a certain test variation performed differently with users than the others.   

FullStory‘s digital experience analytics platform helps inform these decisions by automatically indexing every customer interaction with your site or app and delivering actionable insights to improve the customer journey with session replays and intelligent heatmaps.  

Our latest Digital Labs Event featured FullStory and joint customers, Zillow Group and The Financial Times, who demonstrated a few essential ways to create the ultimate customer experience using the powerful combination of FullStory and Optimizely.  

Here are three ways that make us better together:    

Discover real pain points in the digital customer journey to help prioritize your experiment 

FullStory provides the flexibility to build and define any customer funnel to track how users move through key actions towards a goal. With funnels, you can identify issues that are causing user drop-off, learn whether performance differs across unique customer cohorts or by dimensions like device or browser type, and measure the severity of impact of those problems. Review FullStory’s automatic alerts on frustration signals like Rage Clicks and Dead Clicks to see where visitors are getting stuck. Once you’ve defined and prioritized customer problems - backed by FullStory data - that you want to tackle, design and run experiments in Optimizely to validate which solutions best reduce those points of user friction.   

“Personally, I would just watch general sessions in FullStory to see how the whole thing was working. The things we’re able to catch and fix–the bugs, the confusion, the friction–I know this experience we’ve built wouldn’t exist today without FullStory.” - Julian Gaviria, Head of User Experience, Thomas  

Drive rapid iteration by combining experience analytics with always-on experimentation  

FullStory’s digital experience analytics platform provides you with key qualitative and quantitative insights across the customer journey so you can drive high-impact digital improvements. Utilize those insights to generate hypotheses, then use Optimizely to safely rollout new experiments across front-end customer touchpoints and backend logic and measure the impact to key metrics with A/B testing. You can see the performance differences of your test variations in Optimizely and use FullStory to see why their performance differed.    

“Optimizely allowed us to implement and iterate on elements at a very rapid pace. Through A/B testing, we could pin down the specific language and design treatments our users were reacting to, ultimately decreasing the amount of time it took buyers to find suppliers of critical PPE. We would not have been able to go as fast as we did without Optimizely.” - Julian Gaviria, Head of User Experience, Thomas 

Understand exactly how users interact with experiments and why variations perform differently. 

After launching your experiments in Optimizely, you can use FullStory to analyze exactly how your customers interact with the different variations of your tests. This will help you validate the results confirming why a winning variation outperformed another, but more importantly, help you learn from losing variations and iterate upon inconclusive experiments.   

Once you’ve added the FullStory snippet to your site, you can configure Optimizely to pass custom variables into FullStory that identify the experiment name and variant name for every visitor session. Once enabled, you’ll be able to easily segment visitors in FullStory based on the experiment and variation they were shown and view live playbacks of their interactions or click maps for insights about aggregated sessions. 

“FullStory is integrated with Optimizely, which allows us to see both the respective A/B test and variation that a user is bucketed into along with a link to a replay of the user’s session. With every test we ran, we would jump into FullStory to watch how users engaged with each variation. Being able to launch a test and immediately see how it’s working—whether users are behaving as we predicted—has helped us move extremely quickly. Within those two weeks, we probably ran more tests than we have in the past three months.”  - Julian Gaviria, Head of User Experience, Thomas  

To discover more about how this integration can transform your customer digital experience and accelerate growth, watch our third Digital Labs event with FullStory, Zillow Group and The Financial Times.  Click here to access the recording.   

Author: Carina Conaghan

Title: Director Global Technology Partnerships

Carina Conaghan, Director Global Technology Partnerships, is based in Optimizely’s London office. Joining Optimizely in 2015, she leads Global Technology Partner Strategy. She is responsible for the development, operation, and monetisation of Optimizely’s Technology Partner Program.

The post 3 key ways Optimizely and FullStory are better together  first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

Listen, I get it. I’m fatigued, you’re fatigued, we’re all fatigued…over COVID-19, but it’s still important to talk about it. In fact, it’s something we will be talking about and writing about for years whether we like it or not, as it was the worst pandemic this generation has ever seen and there’s a lot we can learn from it.   

Think about where we were this time last year: sheltering in place, businesses were closed, toilet paper, hand sanitizer and household cleaning supplies were depleted for months in stores and online, Zoom calls were building in popularity due to working from home, people were holding “birthday parades” outside their homes in lieu of parties and we watched the death toll numbers climb higher and higher each day with virtually no end in sight.  

What a difference a year makes. COVID-19 has given us an opportunity to learn so much about how resilient we are as individuals, business owners and a society.   

Here’s where we stand now: we have thousands of people getting vaccinated by the day, in-door restaurants have reopened, major venues such as Disneyland, Broadway and concert halls are set to reopen, small businesses can start getting back on their feet and contributing to the economy’s recovery, the travel industry is starting to boom once again as people feel safer to fly and stay in hotels and some corporations have reopened their facilities, allowing their employees to go back to the office.  

As we remain in “yellow light” mode – essentially proceeding with caution, we all still need to do our part: get fully vaccinated and ease into social gathering. Doing so will ensure we will remain on the right track to recovery and begin living in our “new normal.” 

The new normal 

It’s a phrase we’ve been seeing everywhere. As we strive to get back to the life we knew prior to the year 2020, many things won’t be the same, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. 

If anything, COVID may have changed the way certain businesses manage their operations for the better. For example, staying in your car until you receive a text message from your doctor’s office that it’s safe to come into the lobby in an effort to avoid overcrowding and spreading germs.

The Department of Motor Vehicles has been practicing the same methods. I don’t hate it; in fact, I think it’s brilliant and I hope this is a permanent change that will mitigate flu season and other illnesses throughout the year by permanently implementing these new business practices.  

This is a time to look back and reflect upon COVID-19’s effects on our key industries and what they need to do to prepare for a new normal. It’s important to determine what has changed as the world went digital along with its changing needs, changing audiences, changing customer service processes, and changing online experiences such as work and school. 

This is our chance to put a positive spin on what has happened to the world and how we can leverage that information to change our mindsets, improve operations and ensure the continued safety of customers upon reopening. 

Fostering a culture of experimentation 

We will be releasing a series of blogs that will set the scene for how businesses are getting prepared to open back up. We will also be focusing on why experimentation is important – especially in the current macroeconomic climate, and how these strategies can help businesses improve their operations going forward. We will be highlighting key industries such as:  

Travel Retail and online shopping Restaurants Video conferencing companies  Financial technologies (FinTech) COVID’s effect on holiday shopping 

As the world opens up again, we will zero in on how businesses will adapt and where they will continue to invest as they foster a culture of experimentation so their employees are encouraged to stay curious, work in a truly data-driven manner and ensure they are delivering the best experiences for their customers in a post-COVID world. 

Winning strategies 

By leveraging experimentation, many companies will have a better idea of where to invest their money, whether if it’s still for digital or brick-and-mortar needs upon reopening, and how they can continue to invest in those winning strategies to perpetuate their business, satisfy their customers’ needs and protect their well-being.  

This is our chance to determine where businesses found ways to not only survive but thrive during this pandemic and how they plan to stay successful.  

What have we learned and who were the hidden winners of the pandemic?  

Find out in our COVID blog series in which we highlight key learnings – and ways businesses in the key industries listed above – have been able to cope with rapid change and high levels of uncertainty.  

The post Post COVID-19: returning to a new normal first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

Let’s start by looking at the traditional banks and branches. In pre-pandemic life, going to a bank to open a checking account or to withdraw money was normal. For the older generation, it was even a “place of familiarity” where bank staff knew their names and foster relationships with them. This has been changing slowly over time already due to a more anonymous, impersonal experience with fewer staff members and more automated machines doing the work of banking professionals. 

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and branches having to close or reduce workforce, the banking sector was forced to accelerate their digitalization. But, it also presented new opportunities for digital banks to develop quickly. It feels like over the past year there have been so many new banks that opened up. 

Whether you are an established bank or a new digital bank, you have one thing in common: user experience needs to be at the top of your list. If your user experience is bad or falling behind your competitors, your users will leave and literally take their money elsewhere. 

In banking, user experience equals trust; customers do not want to give their money to a bank they cannot trust. Gone are the days where customers used to build personal relationships with local branches or have personal contact that can build that trust; technology has taken over and made the user experience more convenient, but less personable. 

What can you do to build more trust with a better user experience?When it comes to online banking, a fast, smoothly running application is key. Performance should be a priority but also reducing bugs, the probability of online theft or any other mishaps that can occur. To help you mitigate problems, new features should be rolled out gradually and through the use of feature flags, which will allow you to toggle them on or off. Bug management is very important and it can help you use tools like Optimizely Rollouts to get you there. Experiment on your users directly through A/B testing in your app or on your site to understand how users navigate through your funnel. Make sure to observe micrometrics and not just macrometrics by seeing every test as a chance to learn more about your users and their behavior. Preventing frustration for your users is also essential. Make sure to guide your users every step of the way, especially during onboarding. Test how/where you can guide your users more or where they struggle by looking at your data points such as error messages, navigating back and forth, bounce/exit rates, etc.Clear and frequent communication with your users in the onboarding process can help reduce customer service messages or calls, as users are informed why they have not received a bank account yet or where they are in the process of approval. This will alleviate any frustration customers may experience due to ambiguity on behalf of the bank. When it comes to dealing with finances, customers want immediate answers so that they feel secure in knowing the bank has a handle on making sure every encrypted transaction is completed accurately and safely. Provide your users with clear error messages. Test different message types with various calls to action and colored action buttons to see what they respond to the most and feel most comfortable with.Looking ahead

FinTech is more than just banking; it also involves payment providers or tools such as Mollie, Stripe, Square, Venmo and the like. And, of course, brokers such as Robinhood or DeGiro. These companies are all aiming to meet the same goals of making their customers happy by helping them feel like they can trust whoever they choose to manage their finances and create convenience for making payments, deposits, transfers, taking out loans, etc. 

That applies on any day, but especially during a pandemic when everyone is supposed to stay safely at home, and still be able to electronically manage their funds at the same time. Even after the world begins to open back up again, online banking should be ubiquitous and trustworthy.  

Regardless of which area of FinTech you are involved in, gaining and sustaining your customers’ trust should be your main concern when running an experimentation program, especially now in a post-pandemic world with more digital users than ever before. It’s important to get an idea of their user experience and behavior so you can meet them halfway in satisfying their needs and concerns.

The finance industry saw a huge acceleration in their digital transformation through COVID-19. Now it is up to each banking institution to win the race and win customers. Doing it through optimal user experience and experimentation on a daily basis to stay on top of user trends in the industry will get you there.

The post The FinTech industry experimentation post-pandemic first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

If 2021 has been an experiment in whether the world needs what we have to offer, the results are in (and statistically significant). The answer is a resounding yes.

This week, we were proud to be named a leader in The Forrester Wave: Feature Management and Experimentation, Q2 2021 — and that’s on the heels of our being named a Leader in The Forrester Wave: Agile Content Management Systems (CMSes), Q1 2021 as well as our showing up as a Leader in the 2021 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms.

We see a world where digital experiences are created and optimized by understanding the behaviors of your customers.  With three back-to-back analyst reports naming us as Leaders in 2021 alone, it’s clear that this vision, as well as our investment in innovation and customer success, is resonating with the industry.

We wouldn’t have gotten here without our customers. Their needs are our calling. The leaders at the amazing companies we work with have told us that they need to move from guesswork to a data-driven approach to achieve high ROI for their digital investments and content.

That’s why we remain focused on delivering the most modern Digital Experience Platform, one that empowers our users to understand their own customers and act on that understanding at the right moment.

Our approach is cutting edge, but it’s not just being new that makes us the best. It’s the thinking that goes into our products. One of my favorite books so far this year has been Adam Grant’s Think Again, where he outlined the value of taking a scientific approach to business problem-solving. So often today, you’ll see companies say that they know what their customers want out of a digital experience, but in reality, they are making all kinds of unwarranted assumptions about customer preferences.

But at Optimizely we have bet that the only thing that we know for sure is that customer preference is always changing. And that single-point-in-time surveys or guesswork won’t keep you up to speed. You have to look at behavioral data. Our success has proven that this was a good bet, and because of it companies everywhere now have the ability to optimize each customer’s digital experience.

To date, we have helped over 8,000 brands unleash their digital potential, with 3.8 billion page views and 450 million unique user experiences generated because of our tools. We’ve achieved that kind of scale because experimentation is just one part of Optimizely’s suite of solutions. When combined with our built-in solutions for content, commerce, personalization, and data, you get a total digital experience platform that encompasses the full potential of the future of DXP.

In the 2021 Gartner Magic Quadrant, we received “differentiated” scores in the following criteria: experimentation, audience targeting, and vision. It’s that last category that excites me most. We have the technology. We have the expanding customer reach. But most importantly, we have the total vision for the future of our industry.

Gartner Disclaimer:

Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in our research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

The post We’ve Won Three Leadership Recognitions in 2021! Here’s What That Says About The Future Of Digital Experience first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

It is without a doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a tremendous impact on the retail industry. While omnichannel- and digital-first retailers have managed to pivot more easily and respond quicker to sudden changes in consumer behavior, retailers focused on in-store experience and service have struggled to keep up. 

The pandemic has significantly changed consumer behavior. In some cases, permanently. 

We’ve seen exponential growth of online grocery shopping (+57%*). Ecommerce sales in department stores, apparel and beauty have gone up 10 percentage points since the start of the pandemic (source: McKinsey, 2021). And new omnichannel models like Buy Online Pick Up In Store (BOPIS) have become increasingly popular (+28% YoY**). 

While some of these changes in consumer behavior may slowly settle and return to pre-COVID standards, some are here to stay. Consumers report that they plan to continue using BOPIS (56%***) and Grocery Delivery (45%****) in a post-pandemic world. 

It is more important than ever for retailers to be able to respond quickly to changing consumer needs and expectations. As I mentioned in my blogpost on how to win in a post-COVID world, it is essential for businesses to work in a truly data-driven manner and experiment every step of the way. 

Besides adopting a data-driven and experimentation-first approach, retailers can set themselves up for success in a post-COVID world by leveraging consumer loyalty, bringing an in-store feel to the digital experience, providing consistent digital experiences and building high-performing landing pages. 

Provide consistent digital experiencesMake sure that all digital channels and platforms provide similar levels of service and offer a consistent, recognizable experience. Ask yourself whether you’re providing the same functionalities (e.g., 3D product display) on both mobile web and desktop or whether you offer the same payment options for app and web. Analyze your consumer data to understand which platform or channel your consumers prefer to use and for which purposes. Tailor the individual channel experiences to specific user groups if needed, but make sure to provide a consistent level of service across the board. Optimizely’s feature management capabilities can be used to rollout features across all of your platforms, and assess their performance through feature tests. Experiment on some of the key features that you provide to your consumers, like the chat functionality that you provide on web and app. Can we test a different placement of the chat pop-up? Can we test different self-serve support options for users when starting the chat? Should we provide slight alterations depending on device or between app and web? Run a series of experiments on high-value features to enhance consumer experience across platforms – while keeping a consistent, recognizable level of service.   Bring in-store to digital As consumers weren’t able to do any physical, in-store shopping for most of last year, leading retailers have come up with smart ways of bringing the in-store experience to digital. Especially in parts of the retail industry where consumers have a stronger need to try-on or test products, like in beauty, jewelry and fashion, we have seen more of the in-store experience translated to online. We’ve even seen augmented reality capabilities where customers can determine if a new couch looks good in their living room simply by taking a picture with their phones. Some great ways to bring in-store to digital is by experimenting with personalized service and assistance: whether it is hopping on a Zoom call with a stylist, or offering personalized beauty advice over chat. Consider experimenting with these features to see what works best for your consumers. Provide an optimized experience by testing different placement or positioning of the chat as well its design. Experiment with different ways of offering personalized styling advice to your customers. Do we want to offer it to our loyalty members only? If so, where and how will we place this on our site or in our app? Leverage Optimizely’s Experimentation capabilities to provide optimized experiences.Other ways in which you can either activate and nurture your customers online is by live streaming experiential content like fashion shows and product demos. Again, leverage Optimizely’s Experimentation functionalities to test different ways of promoting the feature or event, optimizing the event’s sign-up feature and personalizing the landing page.    Build high-performing landing pages With more consumers engaging with your brand on different platforms, it is key to send out the same message across your channels and in your marketing efforts. Make sure to align ad content, landing page copy and design as well as the overall execution of your campaigns across your channels. This to deliver a solid brand experience regardless of the device or platform the consumer is using to engage with your brand. Use Optimizely’s AB testing capabilities to test landing pages and optimize web or in-app funnels. Experiment with USP communication, headline copy and campaign visuals, or simply test two or more versions of your landing page against each other.  Use Optimizely’s real-time data to continuously monitor and optimize your landing pages and decide which version of your landing page to roll out to the majority of your users.  Leverage your loyalty Provide tailored experiences. Use Optimizely’s Personalization functionalities to provide tailored experiences to specific user groups, e.g., based on geo-location, preferred shopping category or current loyalty tier. Make your customers feel connected to your business by customizing their shopping experience to their needs. If currently working with a loyalty program, for example, you could personalize the customer experience based on loyalty tier and display exclusive deals or offerings to this user group. Experiment with your loyalty program. Use data analytics and qualitative insights to evaluate how attractive your existing loyalty program is to your regular customers. Create hypotheses to experiment on the benefits you currently offer, but also on the way your Loyalty Program is presented across your digital channels. Use Optimizely Web or Full Stack to test placement, copy and design of your Loyalty Program Content and to evaluate which Loyalty Benefits resonate most with your customers. Optimize your sign-up flow. Turn more one-time shoppers into regular customers by optimizing your Loyalty Program’s sign-up form flow. Understand which parts of your sign-up funnel cause friction and focus your efforts on removing those pain points. Use experimentation to assess which version of a page, form or element works best for your customers.Conclusion

Relying on and leveraging experimentation to determine what your customers’ needs are will help your company stand apart from their competitors every time. It is through experimentation that customers’ preferences will be highlighted so they can have an efficient and smooth experience every time they visit your establishment and more importantly, remember you for it and inspire them to return again and again as loyal ambassadors.   

* , **, ***, **** ‘Adapting to the next normal in retail: the customer experience imperative, McKinsey 2021’

The post Experimentation strategies for the retail industry in a post-COVID world first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

COVID-19 has made organizations aware of their limits and forced them to learn quickly and respond to a highly volatile environment. As we have experienced on a global scale, days of hesitation in decision making can result in escalated business- and societal disruption. 

As my colleague, Jil Maassen mentions in her recent blog post about hidden winners of the pandemic, industries have seen drastic changes in the competitive landscape. Organizations that were able to rapidly pivot in response to a changing market have managed to secure significant portions of market share, while others unable to respond in a timely manner, have largely lost their stakes in the game. 

According to BCG, “Lasting shifts in social attitudes, policy, work and consumption will likely also emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic.” (source: BCG). We will continue to deal with changes in consumption patterns and user behavior, and will face new disruptive businesses entering the markets in which we operate. In a world where change seems to be the only constant, how can we set ourselves up for success and be winners in a post-COVID world?

Create advantage through increased agility 

Throughout the pandemic, we have seen businesses that are able to learn and respond quickly to changing conditions, come out on top. As we continue to face shifts in consumer behavior post-pandemic, increased business agility is essential to thrive amid the new challenges presented by the atypical experience the world just endured.  

Experiment, Experiment, Experiment. Run experiments across all of your (digital) touchpoints, all the time by using Optimizely Web or Full Stack. Use real-time data to inform business decisions. Learn more about your users and their needs with every experiment you run. Use your experiment data, in combination with qualitative and quantitative customer insights to continuously optimize your user journeys. An additional benefit of running experiments continuously is the ability to pick up on any sudden changes in consumer behavior on your site or app, and anticipate accordingly.   Foster a culture of experimentation. By integrating a culture of experimentation within your teams’ and business’ processes, employees are encouraged to stay curious and work in a truly data-driven manner. Letting the data speak for itself will allow organizations to learn quickly about changing consumer needs, and anticipate how to adapt to those rapid changes. As experimentation cultures aren’t built overnight, start by setting up small initiatives that help drive awareness for experimentation on your digital platforms. Set up an experimentation Slack or Teams channel, send out a weekly experimentation newsletter or host an annual ‘experimentathon’ to take your first steps in building out a culture of experimentation. Leverage your loyalty 

Recent studies have shown that 78% of U.S. customers have changed the way they shop and switched brands or stores they frequently purchased with pre-pandemic (source: McKinsey). A reported 17% of customers have shifted away from their primary store. (source: McKinsey) This ‘switching’ behavior has been detrimental to customer loyalty. Organizations that double down on customer loyalty will be able to keep their existing customers from switching, and turn one-time shoppers into regular customers (source: Forbes).

Provide Tailored Experiences. Use Optimizely’s Personalization functionalities to provide tailored experiences to specific user groups, e.g., based on geo-location, preferred shopping category or current loyalty tier. Make your customers feel connected to your business by customizing their shopping experience to their needs. If currently working with a loyalty program, for example, you could personalize the customer experience based on loyalty tier and display exclusive deals or offerings to this user group. Experiment with your Loyalty Program. Use data analytics and qualitative insights to evaluate how attractive your existing Loyalty Program is to your regular customers. Create hypotheses to experiment on the benefits you currently offer, but also on the way your Loyalty Program is presented across your digital channels. Use Optimizely Web or Full Stack to test placement, copy and design of your Loyalty Program Content and to evaluate which Loyalty Benefits resonate most with your customers. Optimize your Sign-up Flow. Turn more one-time shoppers into regular customers by optimizing your Loyalty Program’s sign-up form. Understand which parts of your sign-up funnel cause friction and focus your efforts on removing those pain points. Use experimentation to assess which version of a page, form or element works best for your customers.Tap into new user groups and win them over 

As brand loyalty has been decreasing across industries, now is the time to tap into new markets and user groups. Use this current momentum – lack of brand loyalty across industries – to win over new customers with attractive offerings and a frictionless digital experience. Once you’ve won over new customers, your tailored Loyalty Experience will convert your customers into brand ambassadors for life. 

Optimize your landing pages. Send your (paid) marketing traffic to different versions of your landing page by using Optimizely’s Web or Full Stack capabilities. Evaluate which messaging, visuals, offerings and/or educational content have the highest success rate of turning new users into paying customers.Provide an efficient online experience. Optimize the end-to-end digital experience for your new users. Use data analytics and additional customer insights to understand which touchpoints new users have with your brand, and how they navigate the site or app. Use these insights to build hypotheses on how to remove points of friction. Experiment with different solutions across the new user’s journey. Implement the variations that perform best.    Conclusion

Experimentation is the key to winning not just in an immediate post-COVID world, but for the long haul. Experimentation reveals all about what your customers expect of you and is the key to being one step ahead of their expectations and meeting them halfway, creating the path of least resistance to satisfying their needs and helping their lives improve upon discovering your business, which will compel them to return again and send referrals your way. 

The post How to succeed in a post-COVID world first appeared on Optimizely Blog.

Since the end of 2019/beginning of 2020, everyone has heard the term COVID-19 or coronavirus. During the first couple months, most of us did not know what to expect. We did not know that this virus would rule our day-to-day for more than a year. No one imagined that schools would go virtual, shops and restaurants would shut down or operate at “take out” capacity only or that borders would be closed. 

When the first lockdown and quarantines happened, most businesses did not know how hard they would be hit. Some say that the economic shock has hit us harder than the financial crisis in 2008. Others are predicting a recession that will last several years post-pandemic. 

According to Nariman Behravesh, Chief Economist at the consulting firm IHS Markit, “It is mostly the uncertainty and the fear of catching the virus that is stopping consumers from going to the places they normally would, and that’s hurting the economy. […] It’s not quite as bad as the Great Depression in the 1930s, where the output drop was sustained over a three to four-year period, and the unemployment rate went up to 25% in the U.S. This time, so far it only went up to 13% in the U.S., but it’s the worst downturn we’ve had globally since the 1930s.” 

Globally, there has been a huge hit. Some countries and regions were hit harder than others and some have not yet seen the light at the end of the tunnel. The western world is slowly recovering with up to 30% growth predicted for country GDPs by experts in the third quarter of 2021. 

Looking at the “Global Economic Prospects” report by the World Bank, the world economy shrank by 4.3% in 2020, similar to that of the Great Depression and two world wars. But what are the costs? According to The Economist, the calculations should start with an estimate of how global GDP would have evolved if COVID-19 did not happen. 

“One simple baseline is the World Bank’s projection released this time last year, when it was still blissfully unaware of the lurking viral threat,” said The Economist, 2021. “Back then, it expected global GDP to expand by 2.5% in 2020 to $86 trillion. Compared with that figure, the shortfall of global GDP last year was probably more like 6.6%. That is equivalent to about $5.6 trillion (at the market exchange rates and prices prevailing in 2010, which the bank uses for analytical convenience).” 

But it wasn’t all bad. There are several industries or sectors that managed to thrive greatly. Let’s have a look at those:

Online shopping and shipping

It’s the most obvious one as we all benefited from it – online shopping. Some businesses reacted quickly and created webshops and ecommerce services that did not have any before. Others re-focused their resources from brick and mortar to online. 

I am sure we all relied on Amazon and other online businesses a few times during the pandemic. However, more interestingly was the rise of online grocery shopping. Due to strict lockdowns, some countries nearly forced it upon their people. This helped grocery stores really take off in the online shopping sector. 

Of course, one should not forget those that actually conduct the delivery and perpetuate the supply chain. Shipping and mailing companies had a very different COVID-19. They had more work than ever, tighter schedules, more volume but also fewer people (due to government restrictions). It presented a very different challenge, but financially is still seen as one of the winners of the pandemic. 

The question that remains is how the retail industry will continue to function post-pandemic. Will consumers continue buying online as we’ve adapted to the convenience or will we have a whole new appreciation for brick-and-mortar stores? 

Video conferencing and distributed work tools

We have all been there – days where we feel we spent our entire day on a Zoom call. According to The Verge, Zoom, a video conferencing and webinar platform, “surpassed 300 million daily Zoom meeting participants” in April 2020. It was one of the fastest growing apps during the pandemic, as it was the first choice made by most businesses, governments, schools and households to connect with each other more closely during the lockdown. Let’s have a look at some Zoom Statistics: 

$2.6 billion revenue in 2020, equal to 317% increase year-over-yearMeeting participants increasing by 2900%470,000 business customers as of December 2020 compared to 82,400 in 2019Over 90,000 schools used Zoom during the pandemicOver 45 billion minutes of webinars were hosted on the platformDownloaded 485 million times in 2020

Similar to Zoom, other digital work platforms thrived. One of the most known online collaboration tools is Miro. The business model was designed to help people in a remote working environment. As of 2020, nearly all industries experienced some form of remote work. This helped Miro and tools similar to it grow to support more than 100,000 customers and made it on The Forbes Cloud 100 list (rank 57). During the pandemic it “experienced 301% growth; measured by unique users, it grew 449% year over year,” according to Okta, Business at Work Report, 2021.

Experimentation for remote work tools:

Running experiments as a B2B Marketing team can be hard, as traffic numbers are usually the problem. For Video Conferencing or Collaboration tools right now, this should no longer be an issue. Use this chance to run experiments on (sign-up) forms to optimize for higher completion rates. If needed, use Stats Accelerator to run tests, which will aid in reaching statistical significance faster through automatic allocation of visitors into variations.Marketing campaigns or “flash sales” can be tested through Multi-Armed-Bandit tests that allocate traffic into the winning variation without opportunity cost. Use Feature Tests to run experiments in the application to continuously optimize for adoption such as testing how to encourage users to use the chat function more. As traffic is high and these tools are being used around the clock around the world, disrupting the service is not feasible. Mitigating risk while deploying a new feature or functionality is key. In order to do so, feature flags are crucial. It allows the product team to roll out new features gradually, but it also has a “kill switch” that anyone can toggle on or off, regardless of engineering abilities. Product teams might also want to look into exploring new features and understand how these features will resonate with customers. In order to do so without having to build and deploy the entire new feature, a painted door test could be run using a feature test by installing an image without any functionality in the tool. Once users click on it, this can be measured. However, be mindful of this to avoid negative user experience and make sure to inform the user with a pop-up upon click that this feature is being explored/still in development. Performance is key. Lagging videos or clunky mouse movement in these collaboration tools directly impact user experience. By running performance tests using Optimizely Full Stack, the product team can test how to improve this continuously. 

We have found a new way of working and being productive. Remote work has become the norm and we need tools and software to allow us to do so. These existed pre-pandemic, but did not receive the attention that they do now. The pandemic has helped them dominate and transform the workplace. The question that remains is how open will businesses be to continuing remote work post-pandemic? There are many conflicting views and it seems that some senior leaders have not fully trusted in remote work despite the nearly a year and half worth of proof that production levels either sustained or increased. 

Other fortunate corporations out there are not only shutting their doors for good, but using the extra money in which they would have invested for leasing costs and utilities to provide equipment for their employees so they can work from home at full capacity.

Gaming and gambling

When the pandemic first started, some gaming and gambling sites saw the biggest user rush ever, to the point where they installed virtual waiting rooms to admit users to the sites to prevent them from crashing or overloading. 

Whether it was the additional time that some had to spare due to lack of commutes or potentially even lost jobs, or if it had to do with the uncertainty of the future to be more willing to take risks while gambling, both industries saw huge successes throughout the pandemic. 

Experimentation for gaming and gambling:

For many sites, it is hard to reach statistical significance with their regular traffic numbers, especially further down the funnel. Due to the newly gained popularity and higher traffic numbers, reaching statistical significance even farther down the funnel has become more attainable. As new users have joined and the pandemic has caused a shift in user behavior, run A/B tests again on areas such as minimum “free” games, risk levels or other thresholds that have been determined prior to the pandemic. Furthermore, the pandemic has sparked different user needs such as a much stronger need of belonging and community. I would look into exploring how games that incorporate a community and collaboration aspect work for your users. Add a new category to your page around this or try to push these games more on the homepage/game listing page by adding a badge “collaboration” to it. This can be easily done with the Optimizely Web Visual Editor. Through Personalization and Adaptive Audiences, you can explore which game types work best for your users and customize their experience accordingly. Think about adding a Recommendation widget to your games to encourage users to try out new/different games once they have completed the current one.

One must not forget the role that Netflix played with its very popular series “The Queen’s Gambit”. The site “chess.com” became one of the most visited gaming sites and acquired more users than ever before during this time, experiencing its 10-year growth plan in just three months. 

According to CNN, “Since March [2020], it has added 12.2 million new members, including 3.2 million who joined after the show’s debut in late October.” (CNN, 2020). There was another dimension to this: female chess players. According to CronkiteNews, “More importantly, the role of a female chess champion in Beth Harmon sparked a movement for [women] to play a game that has been mostly played by men.”

Restaurants

Restaurants had to close their doors to customers for months on end throughout most of the world. One could say they were hit the hardest during the pandemic. So, why are they here on the hidden winners list? Well, the pandemic forced many restaurants to get creative. 

Of course, delivery services existed previously, however, these were mainly offered by pizza businesses. However, the pandemic allowed all eateries, even Michelin-star restaurants, to rely on delivery services. One could experience fine-dining quality at home, or prepare a meal themselves with clear instructions on final preparation presented by YouTube videos. They even provided QR codes that activated different dinner playlists to accompany the meals for an added bonus. 

Before the pandemic, this would have been unheard of and, let’s be honest, most chefs (and customers) would have not been open to this. It is a winner in the sense of business model innovation. Financially, it might have not been a winner and many restaurants have struggled throughout. But, the pandemic has inspired creativity to flourish. 

Experimentation for restaurants:

Online booking systems are still playing a huge role, as some countries are requiring COVID test results or vaccine passport proof upon entry. Thus, online booking systems are being used frequently and a larger part of the user experience prior to restaurant entry. In order to provide the user with a holistic positive user experience, the booking engine needs to work smoothly. In order to improve this, running A/B tests using Optimizely Full Stack can be helpful to provide a better ease of use. Some restaurants have opted for online menus and orders at the table using QR codes that are activated via smartphones/iPads/tablets. This might continue in post-pandemic times, thus optimizing the experience and usability of these is crucial. Test the experience while ordering on an iPad using Optimizely Full Stack to create an easier order flow. Furthermore, look into adding Recommendations to the ordering process to encourage larger AOV. Lastly, use the Visual Editor to simplify the menu and ‘where’ to find the right dish. Through Adaptive Audiences, one could also look into creating a more customized menu for the user. 

The same thought applies to gyms and online classes such as yoga. Online courses or apps for fitness were a huge market even prior to the pandemic. However, they have also experienced new levels of demand throughout and post-pandemic. 

A positive outlook 

The pandemic has shown the world the need to work together to solve a problem. Without “working together as one,” we will not succeed in fighting a pandemic or working toward climate change, or any other issues that will keep our planet happy and healthy. 

Also, in an effort to mitigate the personnel shortage and long hours for those working in healthcare like we saw during the pandemic, this rise of robotic assistance will provide stronger and faster aid to nurses more in the future so that patients can get the care they need and healthcare workers can get the respite they deserve. 

The impact on industries like travel and tourism will continue to improve, as we see a surge in vacation bookings as the world opens its borders to those who are fully vaccinated. 

I believe there will be more (hidden) winners emerging from this pandemic, despite the costs and struggles that the global economy has experienced. We can come out of this stronger than we were before and be better equipped should something like this ever happen again in our lifetime and prepare future generations for a full recovery.

The post Thriving industries – the (hidden) winners of the pandemic first appeared on Optimizely Blog.