Overview
Timeless Classics
Digital creative design for Women’s Fashion Retail.
Bluestem Brands requested digital creative designs for the Appleseed’s lifestyle brand. The target audience were Women aged 55+ with a mid-high income level. Creative solutions had to be inspirational, informative and clear. as well as aligning with stakeholder goals of increasing conversion rates and overall profitability.
Appleseed’s is a New England based women’s fashion retailer. Founded in 1946 in Beverly, MA the brand proudly offers all-American styling focusing on quality, polish and timeless tailoring. Appleseed’s has grown to a mid-sized company averaging $51.1M in sales revenue and a dedicated customer base.
Goal
Set a new standard
Providing tools and roadmaps for digital creative team success
Key goals included:
Clean Up UX/UI
Clean up communication and improve user experience on the Homepage by setting digital brand standards on typography, imagery and asset design. Adhering to ADA and WCAG standards.
Support Plans
Support campaign initiatives by identifying best assets necessary across the site and design the web assets to have a unified look and communication.
Communicate Clearly
Oversee email design to create clear and appealing customer messaging in order to increase click throughs and conversion rates.
Boost Metrics
Present business demand plans on the homepage in an appealing manner to drive up conversion and profits.
Build A Team
Set easy brand standards for the digital design team to follow in order to present an elevated brand look, as well as making room for team creative brainstorming and trying new tactics.
Role
Adobestock Image
Digital Creative Manager
Management of creative team and planing of designs.
Oversee homepage, email and social media UX and UI creative.
Advise on WCAG and ADA standards as well as best UX/UI practices.
Maintain an elevated and simple brand voice.
Lead a team of 4 direct reports of digital designers, copywriters and a retoucher.
Work in agile, cross-functional teams composed of content planning, marketing and e-comm operations.
Plan with senior leadership and stakeholders to meet business initiatives.
Evaluate and adjust workflows to improve productivity.
Audience
Women 55+
Looking for clothing with timeless styling and high quality of fabrication.
Prudent, sophisticated and calculated.
Mid-high income level.
Prefer clothing that is timeless, of good-quality and posh.
Need clothing that flatters and easy to care for.
Discovery
4 Questions
Asking who, what, why and how?
Reading customer feedback, reviewing performance reports, conducting competitive analysis, user journey and listening to immediate and cross-functional teams and stakeholder pain points, I identified opportunities for a better customer experience and higher conversion rates.
Customer Persona:
User Journey:
Competitor Research:
Direct competitors research revealed:
Boosting brand messaging via mission statements makes the brand look more sincere and trustworthy.
Leading with a bold editorial hero commends viewer attention. While using photography with focus on texture and feel of a product communicates high-quality of fabrication.
An overview trend format creates an inspirational experience for the customer and encourages her to explore beyond her original goal.
Having minimal promotional banners allows customers to focus on the overall collection.
Closely adhering to ADA standards allows for a pleasant, focused and simplified shopping experience.
In-direct competitor research revealed:
Showcasing best sellers or top programs provides social proof to help drive conversions. Adding star reviews and testimonies to “Best-Sellers” provide instant social proof to help drive interest.
Digital assets with typography that does not pass WCAG contrast requirements, are barely legible and have endless loop animation are highly distracting.
Repeating messaging on quality of fabrication elevates the brand.
Specifically, women 55+ need clear, accessible and easy to navigate e-comm shopping experiences to maintain interest in the content and complete checkout. The Appleseed’s customer seeks a reliable brand with high quality fabrications and enjoys opportunities for education and inspiration.
By rebranding digital assets to focus on heritage and quality, as well as offering inspirational and annotated trend stories, I hypothesized that the Appleseed’s customer would gain an educational, dependable and inspirational shopping experience.
Stakeholder Pain Points:
Cross-functional teammates and key stakeholders had concerns regarding hurdles to delivery and rushed quality of design executions. Listening to the pain points, I recognized the need for early visibility into digital creatives to allow ample room for discussion and adjustments by senior leadership and key stakeholders. We also needed thorough working sessions in agile teams to address design planning from multiple perspectives.
Solutions
Strut Your Brand
Boosting strengths of heritage, quality and dependability.
Set brand standards aligning with ADA requirements across digital assets and created brand style guides while allowing for creative pursuit of new tactics and fresh design appeal.
Created a new workflow of presenting homepages lo-fidelity wireframes to stakeholders on monthly basis. Giving opportunity for alignment on campaigns, key messaging and promotions.
Repeating callouts like pure or high quality natural materials, helps to boost an elevated brand fabrication message.
Using a mission statement banner to project pride of heritage and dependability of the brand.
Created a “Perfectly put-together” outfitting section and where to wear them. Exposed an ensembles category previously undiscoverable in the navigation. This category presented inspirational value to the customer and a large conversion opportunity for the company.
Introduced a “Customer Favorite” section to showcase key demand items on the homepage for items that were not covered in other homepage sections. The using a 1x6 design allowed for exposure of multiple items without lengthening the homepage.
Improved metrics on a low performing “Collections” section by applying a quad layout of core trends and categories. Going from single digits of attractiveness on clickmaps to strong double digits. Giving the customer an easy overview of the seasonal collection.
Using responsive design to instate a mobile-first approach. Recognizing that 50% of Appleseed’s customers interact with the digital products via Mobile. Analyzing and trimming the designs to allow for quick access to key programs and trends by using features such as horizontal scrolling of certain sections and grid layouts on the Mobile assets.
Breaking down complex site updates into MVP’s and working with teams towards next sprint goals.
Assigned hierarchy to stakeholder programs so that important high-demand messaging appear above the fold on desktop while supporting additional invites in emails. Working closely with Omni-channel teams to have a cohesive campaign messaging and look across print-digital and social platforms.
Results
Brand Affirmation
What Appleseed’s stands for.
Appleseed’s homepage and email digital creative is in-line with it’s competitors. The designs puts our customer first by creating simplified, informative, inspirational and ADA complaint designs that highlight Appleseed’s classic styling and quality. Continuous improvement strategies have been implemented by analyzing customer interaction data such as bounce rates and conversions, analyzing competitor research and customer reviews to reveal insights.
The updated experience meets stakeholder demands by giving exposure to large demand programs as well as provides a source of inspiration to customers. Campaigns are easily supported through omni-channel and multiple category assets with a unified look and voice.
The overall planning process has been improved by presenting lo-fidelity wireframes for stakeholders to review and identify best solutions towards meeting key goals at an early stage of development, avoiding missed opportunities and pressure on teams for last minute changes.
Reflections
Marching Forward Proudly
Continuous improvement
Although there is still work to be done, the Appleseed’s digital assets present a strong branding and informative shopping experience for women 55+, while balancing the needs of various stakeholders. The homepages and emails have come a long way in their brand voice, are ADA complaint and easily deliver targeted campaign messages.