Cisco builds site for more eyes
CISCO SYSTEMS
has the world's busiest
business Web site and
expects $3.8 billion in
e-commerce this year,
so rolling out a more
streamlined look for
users does not come
without extensive
testing and much angst.
User testing critical to success of highest-volume
e-commerce site
BY STEPHEN BUEL
Mercury News Staff Writer
ONLY five days remained until the
world's leading business Web site
would unveil a new look. But now, in
user testing of a potential design, one
blue-chip customer was losing his way.
His assignment was to find
French-language product information
on the home page of Cisco Systems
Inc. The managers of Cisco
Connection Online -- who expect to
sell almost $3.8 billion of products via the Web in 1998 -- thought they'd
made it easy for him with a handy new
''COUNTRIES/LANGUAGES'' button. There was only one problem;
he couldn't find it.
A devoted customer who had agreed to participate in the company's
ongoing customer testing program, this network engineer had
demonstrated his agility on the Cisco Web site. But now he was
stumped.
''Does that mean that I have to go to France first?'' he asked in
desperation. Then he admitted: ''I'm lost.''
Behind the one-way glass, Cisco consultant Dan Abelow asked the
engineer where he'd like to see the information. Without hesitation, he
suggested a button up at the top of the page -- right where it actually
was.
''Oh, wait a minute, I see this now,'' the engineer said. ''It's too small.''
Such is the decidedly low-tech process that managers of the world's
highest-volume electronic commerce site use to stay close to their
customers. The 90-minute session involving this engineer was one of
five held at the company's on-campus testing facility Wednesday. He
was paid $100 and promised anonymity.
Today, Cisco unveils the results of that testing, a cleaner and more
streamlined look for Cisco Connection Online, which can be found at
Cisco.com.
To the casual observer, a new Web site design might seem a small
thing. But to a company that in September alone handled roughly 1.4
million visits and processed 66 percent of all its orders online, it's very
serious business.
''When you see someone struggle to use your site, man, that means a
lot,'' said Mathew Burns, Cisco's development manager for interactive
marketing tools. ''The temptation is to want to go off in another room
and make a fix to that page.''
Which is precisely why nothing else can take the place of actual
customer observation.
''We feel like we've learned a lot and made some significant
breakthroughs in our understanding,'' said Chris Sinton, the director of
Cisco Connection Online. ''There are some wildly complicated and
totally impressive-looking sites that are unsuccessful because the
developers didn't focus on what the user is looking for.''
Cisco is nothing if not successful. This quarter alone, the world's
leading manufacturer of Internet hardware and software expects to sell
$1.4 billion worth of products and services online. That's up 46 percent
from last quarter -- or annualized revenues of $5.6 billion.
And Cisco doesn't just sell online. It also services what it sells, last
month uploading 273,981 software files and handling 289,424 technical
support inquiries. Seventy-seven percent of the questions that
registered Cisco customers asked the company were answered online.
''Notice how strategic the Web has become for Cisco,'' said Patricia
Seybold, a computer industry consultant and author of the forthcoming
book, Customers.com, which devotes part of a chapter to Cisco's online
success. ''And it's not because they sell routers and Internet hubs. . . .
They could not have grown to the size they are without having done it
this way. And because they recognize that, they spend time and money
doing continuous improvements.''
Like Seybold, Sinton and Burns believe that Cisco's success stems from
its obsession with customers. Cisco receives hundreds of customer
suggestions and complaints each week via e-mail. These are then
compiled, analyzed and distributed to the dozens of company employees
-- they're called ''business owners'' -- responsible for various portions
of the company's Web site.
Three phases
''There's three phases to this, which are gather, analyze and act,''
Burns said. ''And you really need to do all three phases.''
It's not enough at Cisco to simply pass on the customer feedback,
standard practice at many companies when it comes to outside
suggestions or complaints.
Follow-up is expected, and if no action is taken on something that
warrants action, the unresolved issue can be kicked upstairs to Sinton.
''Cisco does a great job of really noticing what customers complain
about by phone and by e-mail and then making that the priority list for
what they have to fix,'' Seybold said. ''For example, the first thing
customers complained about was it's too hard to place an order. And
then they fixed that.''
Cisco is hardly alone in testing its Web site. For instance, when major
consumer Internet site Excite was thinking about making its home page
entirely customizable by users, it ran focus groups in which computer
users were asked to compare the major Internet search services,
spokeswoman Melissa Walia said.
But few companies do as much testing as Cisco Systems. Abelow said
he's done as many as 20 studies a year for the company, each taking
about a week. Such swift research enables the company to test its
concepts on a Wednesday and deploy the results the following Monday.
Work is recognized
In addition to the financial rewards -- Cisco had net income of $1.4
billion in its latest fiscal year -- the company has been recognized for its
efforts by the Internet industry. Net Marketing magazine has twice
awarded Cisco Connection Online an A-plus, and business consultant
Shelley Taylor ranked Cisco third in overall usability in a recent study of
50 corporate sites in Silicon Valley.
''They're really one of the most aggressive about determining what
should come next,'' Taylor said of Cisco, which has bought some of her
research into Web-site usability.
''What should come next'' is precisely the spirit with which Cisco
rounds up a wide variety of users to participate in regular critiques of its
Web site. Wednesday, for instance, in addition to the engineer who had
the midafternoon slot, Abelow also ran sessions with an account
manager and technical salesperson who resell Cisco products and an
information technology manager and senior network engineer who may
not even be customers.
The test subjects sat by themselves at a computer in a small room.
Abelow, and on this day several visitors, sat in the next room, observing
the computer user through a one-way mirror and talking to users via an
intercom. A big video monitor above Abelow's desk displayed the Web
page the user was visiting.
Wednesday's test featured 18 specific tasks as well as plenty of
open-ended questions. Abelow, whose Florida-based consulting firm is
called Breakthrough Usability Inc., encourages users to think aloud as
they complete their tasks. He wants to know what they're thinking and
why -- particularly if they're having a problem figuring out the Web site.
''You ask the user what's bad and you ask them what should be done
about it, because you want to understand their mental model,'' Abelow
said. Burns couldn't agree more: ''It's terrific to hear what they love,
but we really want to hear what we can improve.''
On Wednesday, Abelow was running road tests of two rather different
variations of a new look for the Cisco Web site. So the first order of
business for each of his visitors was to use their cursor to point at each
part of the page and say what would happen if they were to click there.
Good communicator
The network engineer was a good communicator and his approach was
logical and straightforward. He pointed to each of the page's six main
sections -- ''Products & Ordering'' and ''Software & Support,'' for
instance -- and explained where he thought the various links would take
him. After that, he moved on to two graphics at the bottom of the page
and then, finishing, to the search feature at the top of the page.
''Are there other parts of the page?'' Abelow asked.
In fact, there was another column of information, featuring several
fuzzy gray headings and the small ''COUNTRIES/LANGUAGES''
button set atop a lavender background. It would surprise few
typographers that this user went straight to the easy-to-read text set on
a white background and entirely overlooked the busier column with its
all-capital lettering.
Later, Burns said the lavender section was designed intentionally so
that users would understand that it has a separate purpose than the rest
of the page.
''This is where you put all the ads, and this,'' he said, gesturing to the
main part of the page, ''is where I do all my real work. We want to be
sure it's usable, so there's lots of white space. We also want to be sure
that it's polished.''
But mostly, Burns and Sinton want to make sure that users such as
Wednesday's engineer can accomplish what they come to the site to do
-- learn about software upgrades, discuss technical solutions with their
peers and, of course, buy products.
sjmercury.com
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