Content Strategy Powers A Sales and Marketing-Focused Web Redesign For A Growing Startup

Bazaarvoice engaged Idea (now Astadia) to completely redesign bazaarvoice.com. The existing site failed to clearly explain Bazaarvoice's unique value proposition and was confusing, even when explaining basic product offerings. The client wanted a completely fresh take that ably demonstrated what Bazaarvoice was all about.

The Bazaarvoice team also wanted the website to work harder for the company. Another major goal was to transform the website into a lead generation engine using marketing automation tools and content marketing strategies.

Approach

I, together with an associate creative director, led and executed the redesign process from start to development. We recognized that no redesign would succeed if it did not clearly illustrate what Bazaarvoice offers its customers and what makes those offerings stand out in the marketplace. We expected to gather this information and transform it into a usable, exciting experience.

To our surprise, however, we learned that the company itself was struggling with these explanations. Much of the content that we expected to work with was woefully unclear or missing. Rather than panic, we recognized this crisis for what it was: an opportunity to bring content strategy into the project in a big way. Thus, we redirected our first project phase to focus on gaining and illustrating a better understanding of Bazaarvoice itself before considering any aspects of the design.

Phase 1

Product and Consumer Modeling: I designed and led 10-15 interviews and focus groups with a wide selection of the Bazaarvoice team in order to learn more about the company, its products, and its customers. We analyzed the data from these sessions and developed several models of how Bazaarvoice offerings work for different types of customers. We then reviewed these models with members of the Bazaarvoice team for accuracy. The team's response was both pleasure and relief at seeing their world reflected back to them clearly.

Business Requirements Document: Input from the team sessions was also synthesized into a business requirements document that I completed with a business analyst. The BRD cleanly and simply listed requirements in many different categories.

Messaging Matrix: Once we had a clear understanding of Bazaarvoice the company, its offerings, and how customers used those offerings, we turned our focus to how the website should talk about those offerings. I developed a messaging matrix that clearly laid out how Bazaarvoice's sales and marketing language should talk to each type of customer at each phase of the consumer decision process.

Copywriting: I collaborated with Idea's copywriting team to ensure that the large amount of copy written for the new site clearly reflected the models and messaging developed earlier.

Information Architecture: With all of the above information sorted out, we turned our attention to how it should be organized and presented on the new site. We developed a clear sitemap for bazaarvoice.com and a set of guidelines for publishing content on different parts of the site.

In both cases, we paid special attention to how customers would reach, or be driven to, "gated" content on the site. It was critical for the Bazaarvoice team that the site generate leads by encouraging potential customers to provide their information in exchange for useful downloads and white papers. We made sure that each piece of gated content had a home with many avenues leading to it.

Content Inventory And Mapping: At my direction, other members of the Idea and Bazaarvoice teams assembled a listing all of the content on the existing site. They then collaborated to move the content worth keeping to the right places in the new site's architecture.

Phase 2

Interaction Design: The associate creative director and I created wireframes for each major section on bazaarvoice.com and various key site widgets in a shared Axure project. We also delegated lower-page-level work to additional team members as the project neared completion. Throughout the design process we collaborated closely with the customer, iterating on big and small ideas.

Analytics: I directed two analytics experts on my team in the creation of an analytics strategy plan for the site. This plan included element- and page-level tracking plans as well as strategies for tracking gated content, all using Google Analytics. The group also created a dashboard that would be populated once the site went live.

Visual Design: The associate creative director took the lead on visual design, while I provided ongoing user experience input.

Development: Our development team took the lead on constructing the site, while I provided ongoing user experience input.

Impact

The bazaarvoice.com site launched to great acclaim from Bazaarvoice staff and customers. It was clear that our intense focus on channeling a clear understanding of the company and its offerings into a well-defined content strategy paid off. Sample client feedback demonstrates how well the new site accomplished it goals:

Sample Project Wireframes