How I Discovered & Would Fix A Million Dollar Revenue Leak

A simple user test exposes a revenue leak that could cost millions.

In 2009, a friend of ours decided to buy a family home for the first time.

Whilst going through the mortgage application process, they needed to see their credit score. So they opened an online account with a credit reference agency.

After a successful house purchase in 2009, our friend didn't need the credit reference account. So they followed the process to remove the payment card on file. The credit reference account fell into oblivion, and sat unused.

Fast Forward 9 Years, 1 Marriage & 2 Kids Later

Today, our friend needs a bigger home (and an updated credit reference score). With the same email address still active, can the good old trusty credit reference account be reactivated?

Why yes. Yes it can (with a little wrangling with customer support)!

At That Point, I Turned This Situation In To A User Test

My curious nature wanted to see how the credit reference website stood up to a user test. Did it have any potential revenue leaks, and could it benefit from revenue recovery?

We had all the perfect elements in place:

• A necessary measurable outcome (a free 'statutory' credit report was required by the user)
• A new terrain to navigate in order to reach this outcome (the credit reference agency website)
• A desired outcome for the company (the credit reference agency would like a new paid credit score customer)

Interesting User Testing In Action:

Here's what you see when you log in to the credit report account:

Observation 1

Firstly, I saw the user repeatedly clicking on the grey box on the top right of the page 'Statutory Credit Report'. This led to no response from the site. Turns out it is just a marker to know you are viewing the free statutory credit report.

If that box was activated and linked to a related page, it would have been much better in terms of a more practical and hence, happier customer experience. The user told me they expected this to lead directly to their free credit report, which it didn't.

A confused mind never opens their wallet and gives your their cash, my friend.

Observation 2 (potentially millions being lost here)

Let's take a look at that account summary/offer page again. Look at this:

I've added green boxes 1 and 2. The two buttons here might look the same but they are slightly different. I'll get back to that in a moment.

In this user test, the user wanted their free credit report. They clicked the button at the top (in green box 1) to do this.

That seemed reasonable to me.

We both expected the the next page to give access to their free credit report. However, we were both surprised to see this:

Oops.

That looks like a payment page. The user wanted a free credit report.

That's probably why they instantly clicked the 'back' button and left the payment page (hint: this is a page that the company needs their users stay on, in order to generate the most revenue).

On further interrogation, here's a picture (my artist's impression) of what happened in the user's mind, when they saw that payment page:

BOOM! Did you hear that?

That is the sound of the user running into an imaginary brick 'website' wall. That is a revenue block and revenue is being lost here. There is plenty of space for revenue recovery.

This happens in online website (and offline) sales processes like this all the time. However, this is a high traffic site:

We have:

• An estimated average 600,000 users a month, over the last 6 months
• A ￡7.95 monthly recurring offer
• A high margin offer (zero physical goods, delivery costs etc)
• A potential high lifetime value of a customer

This could be a nice healthy business.

Scratch that. This is a nice healthy business.

What Does This All Mean?

Taking this all into account indicates something very serious. A revenue blockage like the one above could mean millions in lost revenue for a company.

So What Is The Solution?

Disclaimer: The following information comes from my experience only. I haven't run any data gathering/research processes on this site (like I would in a real life scenario with a revenue recovery assessment) but it should all make sense.

Let's start by taking a look at the entry page to the surprising payments page. Remember those green boxes from earlier on? They showed a slight but very definite difference between the two order buttons.

Here it is again, with the differences highlighted:

You'll see the order button 2 (at the bottom of the page) has an asterisk next to the word 'FREE'. The associated text terms, below the button, makes the offer clear:

'*FREE for 30 days then only ￡7.95 per month to continue if you don't cancel within your 30 day free trial.'

However order button 1 doesn't have an asterisk, so the associated text terms are easily missed. And let's face it, an asterisk is easily missed even if it was present.

Button 1 is also positioned at the top of the page. That makes it more likely to be clicked. But without the associated text terms attached, it's easy to be shocked when the supposedly 'free' click lands you on a payment page (which is exactly what happened in our user test).

In order for the important text terms to be read for button 1, they should be next to the button (instead of the far left hand side of the page). The asterisk should also be added to the word 'free' on the button. This lets the user know there is more to the 'free' order than initially seems.

What Else Can Be Done To Recover Lost Revenue?

Remember, the page that scared away the user was the checkout page. So we'll turn our attention there next. 

The Checkout Page

The account summary/offer page above offered a free credit score. Yet when the user clicked through, they saw a payment page.

This confused the user and they clicked away from the payment page.

From my experience I can tell you that it's good practice to understand what a user is thinking at key moments on your site (like on payment pages, when they're about to give you money).

It's very important what users do, and do not see, when they're making a payment.

When signing up for a free trial, users find it confusing if they have to enter payment information.

It seems completely alien - why do you need payment info if this offer is free? It can also generate feelings of distrust.

To get past this revenue blockage, some useful explainer elements can be added to the page.

Something To Explain The Free Trial

Add some text and an eye catching logo at the top of the payment page to explain what is happening:

Explain Why A Payment Card Is Needed For A Free Trial

You'll also see that I added a line of text that offers to explain why a payment card is needed for a free trial. That can explain the reason in more detail, on mouse-over:

Remove Further Revenue Blockages

From previous results I've seen, I'd also add some further questions and answers at the bottom of the page, to overcome additional revenue blockages:

 Here's what the full new payment page would look like:

Remember, in this case, I haven't put the new experimental payment page together using live site data (like I usually would). So it is only built from my experience and ideas for best practices.

However, from the live user testing I ran, I'd wager that the new payments page above, would do a much better job at turning more users into paid trials. It would stop the current sales abandonment and recover all the revenue currently being lost.

The company would also have the option to maximize revenue by removing additional unseen revenue blockages along the way from free trials to fully paid customer.

More Revenue Leaks

In this test the user was confused between a free credit report and free credit score.

So they chose to use the live chat feature to clear this up. They explained that a statutory credit report is always free but a credit score is their own paid product, after a 30 day free trial. That was answered quickly so the company did very well.

Now, it's important to remember that when users communicate using the live chat feature on the site, it's a perfect opportunity to find out where they are having issues.

Chat logs can be looked at to see common questions that occur. Then an effort should be made to answer these roadblocks on the site, before they become full blown revenue leaks.

Live chat also offers a great way to direct the user back to a paid offer, if it makes sense.

In our user test, we gave the live chat operator two nice open doors to do this. But they didn't use it very well, and no offer was made to the user.

Instead of bringing the user back into a sales process, the live chat operator ended the chat. Oh dear.

This is another revenue leak that could cost this company hundreds of thousands in lost sales annually.

A Process Revenue Leak

Revenue leaks don't always fit into singular site changes to the interface. Sometimes they fall into overall experience.

In this case, the free credit score took the user to an existing customer payment page. This was confusing, and caused the user to click away from the page.

Ideally the process needs to line up.

Firstly, if the free trial is available, this should be explained like I did earlier with the new test payment page.

Next, if the free trial is not available to existing users, then the 'order now free' buttons should never be shown to an existing customer.

Also, note that this user had opened this account 10 years ago. Seeing an existing customer notice was confusing to them.

Although yes, it is technically an existing account, I would reset the criteria so if someone hasn't logged in for 5 years, the 'new customer' offers are available to them again (even if the account age stays 'true' on the internal tracking systems).

This behavior matches up more closely because the user feels like a new customer after having the account fall into dormancy due to non use. So it will provide a more seamless experience for them.

That will mean the user is less likely to abandon any important pages on the site, and the company maximizes the revenue they earn per visitor.

Did you like or not like this article? What questions do you have about revenue recovery Leave a comment below. Or tag someone who would be interested in this article.