Slaughtering friction in the eCommerce funnel

This week, I’ve been preparing for South by South West (SXSW, or referred to by the cool kids as simply “South By”) – the annual fiesta of innovation and ideas in Austin, Texas which takes place in March. This year, in addition to the inspirational talks, mood of empowering optimism and delicious BBQ ribs, I will be co-hosting a workshop on eCommerce optimisation with my friend, technical whizz and platform designer Jim Emerson.

Though Jim and I share a love of Glastonbury and Radiohead, our professional worlds seemed far apart. As a planner, I’m interesting in people’s behaviour; in particular the hidden forces that drive people’s choices of products and brands. Jim is interested in developing web platforms and products that elegantly solve business and technical challenges for big business and start-ups.

Yet over a beer, we found we had a powerful connection. Both of us are seeking to make people’s lives’ easier; to make shopping experiences more intuitive, less frustrating and more profitable for the businesses we work for. And for both of us, friction is the enemy.

We came to a realization. Friction in the shopping process costs time, money and angst. Friction leads to billions of dollars of lost conversion. Friction costs the world countless days of productive time. Friction makes usually sane people explode with frustration and rage. Frankly, friction is a f**ker.

So we called our workshop The eCommerce Friction Lab. After perhaps one too many beers, we resolved that our mission would be to slaughter friction in the conversion funnel. All friction must die!

As we have gone about planning frictional genocide, I have discovered again the tremendous power of collaboration across disciplines. At first, Jim and I were a bit like creatures from different planets, meeting for the first time, tentatively seeking areas of mutual understanding. But as we’ve progressed and focused again on the object of our mutual hatred, we have found that we are talking about similar issues, just using different language. For example, when I talk about “reducing the gap between consideration and purchase”, Jim talks about “optimising the landing page experience”. What we both mean is that the more you know about your customer, the deeper into your retail site you can send them and the closer to purchase. At its most simple, the more we can deduce about a customer’s intent, the more friction we can remove.

One month to go and the Friction Lab continues to evolve. If you’re in Austin next month and are interested in joining us, click here to find out more.