For the great outdoor adventurer, REI Co-op is the place to shop. Not only does the company supply high-quality outdoor gear and equipment, but they also provide expert advice and share stories of life outside.
As a co-op, 70% of their annual profits are invested back into the outdoor community. This action helps underscore the company’s dedication to stewarding the outdoors and enables its members to become a part of something bigger.
Membership sign-ups are critical for a booming co-op. That’s why REI chooses to focus on the membership call inside their mobile app. Yet, could the highlighting of the membership and hidden product navigation be hindering their conversions? We could test that.
The Opportunity: Product Navigation Is Hidden in a Hamburger Menu Away From View
Currently, shoppers that visit REI’s mobile shopping app will see a hero image that focuses on the co-op membership. And to begin exploring products, they’ll need to tap the hamburger menu first.
Unfortunately, visitors not interested in the membership or those who are already members may be deterred and bounce from the app.
The Control
Our Hypothesis: Surfacing Popular Product Categories Will Increase Conversions
For years, the typical best practice for mobile was to hide all product and category elements behind a hamburger menu. Now, recent discoveries have uncovered that shoppers need a smoother UX with less click interaction to view products faster.
In a study completed by the Nielsen Norman Group on navigation usage, it was found that people were significantly more likely to use navigation when all or some of the navigation options were visible. This is true for both mobile and desktop.
They found that on mobile, 57% of people used the hidden navigation while 86% of people used the navigation with exposed elements—1.5 more times than hidden.
The Potential Fix: Turn Popular Product Categories Into Tabbed Navigation Elements
As you can see in our variation, we would expose the most popular product categories by creating tabbed navigation elements. Once a shopper opens their app, they’ll immediately have access to popular product categories, so they start shopping instantly.
We hypothesize that this change would increase the discoverability of products to increase mobile app conversions.
The Variation
What Can Cro Metrics Test for You?
Could a hamburger menu really stand between you and increased conversions? You better believe it. That’s why testing is critical to business success. What can Cro Metrics test for you? To learn more about our experimentation and optimization programs, send us a message.