#19: Why Website Optimisation Fails with David Mannheim

~ This transcript is automatically generated so may contain some errors ~

Why are we as retailers within e commerce so beholden to page templates? 62 percent of all users that are on a product detail page are still browsing. 23 percent of all users on a basket page are still refining, less than 5 percent are committing to their purchase.

So what's going on here? He says, taking a sip of his coffee, waiting for some kind of suspense.

Welcome to Statements of Intent. In this 20 minute episode, we're addressing how eCommerce has lost sight of the people at its very heart. You, the customer. It's a chat that's optimistic, it's casual, it's probably slightly ranty in places, but that's okay. But it's a place where I talk to senior eCommerce marketers.

And share their statement of how they're looking to change the status quo of eCommerce, adding more care, being more considerate to those very people that they're selling to - the customer. I'm your host, David Mannheim, the founder of Made With Intent. And we're going to jump right into it. Have fun

Hello everyone. And welcome to Statements of Intent, the podcast hosted by me more often than not. Anyways, David Mannheim. Uh, nice to meet you. Uh, bringing along e commerce leaders, those, uh, passionate about e commerce talking about what they value, how they feel like we should be treating customers, how we should be measuring customers.

Uh, it's like their, their flag in the ground, their personal promise. Their value behaviors.

And my statement of intent, you know, if I'm honest, I have quite a few, but there's one phrase more often than not that we use on this show and indeed over at made of intent and that is stages pages. It's a beautiful rhyming metaphor that basically highlights the fact that the majority of retailers now focus on the page, the location of where the user is.

And that is what they optimize. The PLPs, the PDPs, the baskets, the checkouts, the homepages, these five very arbitrary, very aggregated, uh, page templates that are all about where the location is located. But what about their stage? What about their buying stage, their mindset? Whether they're browsing, whether they're committing, they're refining their purchase, they're deciding that holds no locate, that holds no bars on where they are located.

A user, a person can be browsing and still be on the PDP just because a user's on a product detail page does not mean that they're evaluating. Right? In fact, we, the status that, uh, that we have over a major intent is that 62 percent of all users that are on a product detail page are still browsing. 23 percent of all users on a basket page are still refining, less than 5 percent are committing to their purchase.

So what's going on here? He says, taking a sip of his coffee, waiting for some kind of suspense. Uh, what's going on

here? Why are we, why are we as retailers within e commerce so beholden to page templates? I think there are a few hypotheses that I have. Um, I think the number one hypothesis, I, it's a beautiful thing to like, um, not accept the norm.

Okay. It's fun for one, you know, let's go against the status quo. For two, it's reflective. I mean, I'm quite a introspective, reflective person. I think anyways, I think everybody else should be as well because thinking is reflective. It can often be more productive than doing so. Let's be reflective together.

Let's think about why we as retailers focus on page templates as opposed to buying stages. Okay. Hypothesis number one is that we are beholden to conversion rates. Conversion rate is our measure of success, right? Says the person that founded a conversion rate optimization consultancy, we optimize our conversion rate.

CRO, you owe the C and the R, you optimize the conversion rates. And okay, it's not as simplistic as that, but certainly that's how people see it. I don't think we're going to get away from that. I don't feel. As though when Brian and Jeffrey Eisenberg coined the term CRO, they ever thought that it would create, well, this monster that ironically people within CRO actually hate.

I think Brian Eisberg actually, um, so they coined it in 1998 or they're credited with coining it certainly. And one of the reasons why they coined the term is because it was available. So conversion rate was the only search term that was available on Google, you know, for currency purposes, of course. And then optimization as a term was well known within the search world, search engine optimization.

So they placed the two together for conversion rate. Optimization and Brian Eisenberg, when he created it said that it's a process, not an event, which really interesting, isn't it? Because I feel as though people mostly think it's an event, not a process. Anyway, you know, fast forward 20, 30 years, and we are now beholden to conversion rate as our success metric.

And what is a conversion rate? Well, it's a very highly aggregated figure is an average of average of average of averages. So if it says it's aggregated, if our success metric is aggregated, so too is everything that comes before it. We must aggregate the PLP, the PDP. We must aggregate the user's journey in order to satisfy this, this one metric.

That we have and don't get me wrong. It's easy, right? What i'm sorry, it's not easy. But what I mean by that is that it's an easy thing to think of To boil down a success metric into just one thing, and then to optimize essentially what is five other things, a homepage, a PLP, a PDP, a basket, a checkout is a fairly accessible, easy thing to think of.

And that's what we're all after in retail, right? We're after some level of accessibility, you know, gone are the frameworks. Goodness me, there's just so many to think of. So I, I feel like it's really interesting to just think. As to why we think in pages and not stages. So hypothesis number one is the conversion rate.

Hypothesis number two is that that's the way that websites are built. They're templated. Now I I've never built websites personally. I know of lots of agencies that do build websites and there needs to be some kind of structure of how to build them. And what is a structure? Well, a structure, a process is a template.

So they create templates. They create the, um, the PLP, the PDB, the basket, the checkout, the homepage. I feel like we need an acronym for all five of those just to stop me repeating the same thing over and over again. But the way you build a website ultimately transitions in how you optimize that website itself.

It's really fascinating. So conversion rate, point number one, the way you build websites. Point number two, I think it just feels like we're creating this myopic view on how to optimize a user's journey because of, again, that success metric. And again, that templatization. Interesting, isn't it? That, that we're moving away from templatization from a home, from a website build, you know, everything's becoming more about composable commerce where things are componentized.

Um, you know, we talk about headless commerce a lot, for example, and the Mac Alliance, and that has, um, no way nearly reached the level of maturity. That it can and will indeed do there are stats out there that show the growth of the, uh, of the market year on year and what it will reach in, say, 2027, uh, and it's pretty, pretty big.

So I wonder that if website builds are moving away from templatized pages towards more componentization. Whether your measures of success and by virtue, how you optimize will also do that thing, right? So really interesting. I think that's the that's the old way. Oh, and by the way, what are the What are the problems with that?

You know, why is it not fit for purpose? Well, it's, it's, it's kind of, it's not that it's not fit for purpose. You know, it's, it's efficient. It works, right? I've built a business out of it. So I think I know that it works. It's easy to understand. That doesn't always mean that it's. It's the best way. I mean, ultimately, what you're doing when you're focusing on this conversion rate and templatizing your approach is that you focus on the 2 percent and ignore the 98%.

You focus on the 2 percent that are going to convert or will convert, and you ignore the needs of the other 98%. I think that's quite a well trodden phrase nowadays. Anyways. But it's, it's less about like nurturing your users through a journey. And it's more about pushing them towards a success metric.

This aggregated success metric that we speak of in conversion, right? Which by the way, is highly one way is what you want people to do. Not necessarily what they want to do. Right. It's almost as though we optimize how we sell, not for how people actually buy. I, I, I've had that one in my sleeve for a little while.

I'm pretty sure it's on the homepage of our website. Again, he takes another slurp to create some suspense while you go and check out our website made of Nten ai. Mm mm mm So yeah, you almost, by focusing on the 2%, not the 98%, you are almost, you're almost kind of assuming that everyone on your site. Is ready to buy.

Right. It's, it's, it's really fascinating.

Look, what is, what's, what's this, the antithesis of this drum that I've been beating for some time? It's the antithesis of personalization. Maybe there's some statement to say that conversion is the antithesis to personalization only because of this genericized, homogenized enter all of the eyes, eyes, views of this thing.

I, I wonder if that's the case. I wonder if. I can't remember if I wrote about it in my book, uh, the person in personalization available all good bookstores now, mostly Amazon for 11. 99, absolute ripoff. Um, I wonder if there is an argument to say that the reason why personalization has never been achieved is because it's so hard to do and it's so hard to do.

And we're all lazy as human beings. Let's be candid here that we revert back to the norm, the entrenched way of doing things, which is. Templatization. I, it's, it's less of a, I don't know. It's a fascinating, like, reflective thought that's probably too, far too, far too deep for what I'm recording this on a Monday morning at 8.

30am. I wonder as well, like, where this expectation has come from. Why, Where the expectation of how you should optimize sites, whether it's come from, say, uh, Amazon, um, you know, expectations are always set in retail by Amazon, aren't they? Personalization came from Amazon in Jeff Bezos's shareholder letter in 1997.

He said that personalization will accelerate the very process of discovery. Fascinating that he used those words, by the way. He uses the word process and he uses the word discovery. Potentially suggesting that personalization is only good for a method of discovery. Uh, as opposed to creating a relationship or acknowledging the individual behind the screen.

Something along those lines. And Amazon always set these expectations. So they did that with personalization, they did it with a free delivery, and then it became next day delivery or free next day delivery, and then it became prime, it became same day delivery. They're pushing the boundaries more and more and more, and other retailers have to keep up with this thing.

So when you think about how they optimize, they used to, they don't anymore, uh, from reading books like Working Backwards, by the way, um, who, who wrote Working Backwards. I've got it behind me. It's just there for those of you looking on YouTube and what have you. Um, really great book about how well Amazon tends to work backwards, but they used to optimize on page template.

Speaking about the PDP, I'm pretty sure there's a. A reference somewhere to the fact that no one can run an experiment on our PDP without Jeff Bezos knowing about it or approving it. I don't know whether that's one of those rumours that have just circulated the internet for years and years and years though.

Who knows. So yeah, so if Amazon do it, or did it. It is natural that everybody else will do it, right? Look at recommendations. The proliferation of recommendations is all thanks to Amazon.

Oh, that was a big gulp of coffee. So what this antithesis of personalization discussion is a fascinating one. And I wonder whether personalization has never really been achieved because there's no golden metric for personalization. There's a golden metric behind conversion optimization because it's conversion rate.

But there's no real measure of success for personalization. And as a result, personalization has fallen flat on its feet, flat on its feet or flat on its face, one of them, they've fallen flat basically. And as a result, the efforts that people go to, to personalize are incredibly one way, they're very aggregated.

They revert back to the norm and they falter and they fail. Perhaps it's indeed the measure of success that's the issue and not copying Amazon, it's not. An entrenched way of working. It's just the fact that we can't get past the measure of success. Of personalization. And therefore we revert back to, um, we revert back to conversion optimization towards a templated view.

I maybe that's the solution here. I'm yes, I'm kind of leading you down a garden path that maybe I want you to lead down because I feel like we've solved that as an issue, uh, originally became one of our hypotheses that made of intent is how do you measure the success of personalization, something that in a single metric, something that is Both designed for the retailer and for the user, you know, something that's a balance between the two.

If personalization is all about relationships, how do you create something? A relationship is a two way function. How do you create a metric that measures a relationship? That's fascinating, isn't it? I mean, perhaps it is customer lifetime value, but that's so long term, isn't it? And when things are long term and we're so focused on short termism in retail, it's just going to get ignored.

Yes. It will be reviewed probably when you're talking about the likes of say, Netflix. Uh, proving that personalization worked after 10 years, it took them 10 years. It took them a decade to prove the attribution of personalization, a relationship mechanism, right? That it's just, let's be candid here, it's going to get ignored and retailers will revert back to that short term, um, metric of conversion rate, despite all its flaws, and it will also revert back to.

Therefore, the short term way of, uh, methodologies of doing things is the, is the resolution here, he says, carefully lead it up towards the next chapter. Okay. Well, I think. I think the solution is that it's a more balanced approach.

I look at, you know, the solution is stages, not pages. Don't get me wrong.

That's why we're here. That's what we're going to talk about today. Right. Removing the need for immediacy, removing metrics that are short term, having a more balanced approach. We need a metric, a measure of success that enables us to both personalize and to enable. We need a measure of success that is more reflective of how people actually buy.

People don't buy in templates. They don't buy in pages. So why do we optimize for that function? It's bizarre. It does feel so entrenched when you think about it, when you really break down the constituent components of why we do what we actually do. So I firmly believe we need to step away from pages. I firmly believe.

That is a reflection of how we want them to buy, not how they need to buy. Okay. We don't support, we push, we don't persuade, we manipulate, or sorry, we can certainly and very easily get trapped in those ways of thinking. Because if, uh, our metric success isn't so, is indeed so one way it is indeed so aggregated, it is indeed so short term is, it is indeed so focused on a, uh, a measurement, an attribution that.

Is a, uh, binary event, a yes or a no, you optimize for that binary event. You know, if I'm running a marathon. And my, my success metric is completion. I'm going to do everything that I can to complete that marathon, but I might not take into account the fact that I'm going to get an injury. I might not take into account the fact that I want to run another marathon.

So I'll go hell for leather to ensure that I complete the marathon. But what about my time? What about my hydration? What about my, um, my nutrition? I think it's a bad example that I've just given. We are where we are and I'm just going to accept it and move on. Um, so stages, not pages. It's less about the, um, the page that the user's on, more about the stage that they're within.

Location is not a good indication of when or how a customer will buy. If you can understand the stage that they're at, whether they're browsing, whether they're committing, you are more appropriate to their needs at that point in time. What happens when you're more appropriate? You create more impact.

It's a really simple equation. More appropriate, more impact. More appropriate, more focus, more impact. As you're probably I should probably say if I identify that you as an individual, you're just browsing what I'm going to focus and double down on product discovery. If I understand that you as an individual are evaluating your purchase, I'm going to talk more about the product features and less about recommendations.

I want to talk more about. Um, perhaps the less than the, the, the logistics of the purchase, but more about the aspirational, uh, ideation of buying the product we're talking products, imageries and videos or three 60 views or virtual reality kind of view this in your home type stuff. That's what we're going to focus on.

And we're going to focus less on the logistics of the purchase, the recommendations, the navigation structure. We're going to help you evaluate that product. If we know you're in that stage, that doesn't necessarily mean it is on a product detail page. Okay. So when you understand the stage of the user, you can tell your sales pitch better.

You can personalize it. Right. You can meet users with how they, at the intersection of how they actually want to buy, you're kind of more ethical in a way of doing it, you know, it's, it's less, forgive me, car salesman, but less car salesman and more, I don't know. I'm buying a stereo at Bose. I don't know why that example came into my mind.

What a strange example. Anyway, it's, it's basically what I guess the, the indication that I'm trying to make here is that it's more like being, it's more like a personable cell. It's more like an in person relationship. It's more like being in store. And that's what we all want. We all want that experience of being sold to, sold to, of buying something in store, not sold to in store.

In fact, Convergerate is like being sold to. Right. Understanding the buying stage is, is, is like actually buy it while buying. Isn't it? There's a difference between buying and selling, and perhaps that is the difference. Perhaps conversion rate is a method of selling, whereas conversion, personalization, expected conversion, buying stage, stages on pages is a method of buying.

It was a reflection of buying. I think it's more relevant. It's more human. It's the whole right person, right message, right time thing that enables appropriateness, right? So I think there's so much within this thing that I, I've just talked about the, the ethereal nature of what stages not pages is. I've not talked about the practicalities of it.

I think that's one for another time, or feel free to go away and check out madewithintent. ai. There's loads of content on there. About what a stage is and why a page is an adequate form of measuring a method of customer success. But my statements of intent, my stake in the ground is stages, not pages. The reason why it's my stake in the ground is that it enables us as retailers to be more appropriate to our audience.

Oh, by the way, when we're more appropriate, we create more impacts. That's great. But we also create more of a personability. We will also throw less shit at the wall and see what sticks.

There we go, there's my, there's my statement of intent for an early Monday morning whilst choking on my coffee. And holding What's this person called again for returning bread?

Maymay? It's Maymay. It's Maymay. Well, there you go, me and Maymay say bye for now. Have a great day. And we'll see you next time on Statements of Intent.

There we have it. Thank you so much for listening. Please do like, subscribe and share on whatever platform it is that you're listening to on today. This show comes from the team behind Made With Intent, the customer intent platform for retailers. If you are of course, interested in being more profitable, whilst being more personal.

And please feel free to check us out at madewithintent. ai. Thanks again for listening and joining us on our mission to change how eCommerce sees, measures, and treats their customers. I've been your host, David Mannheim. Have a great day.

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