VWO helps Eastpak close the experimentation loop with a connected platform!

We sat down with Ilse Normington, UX and Web analyst at Eastpak, to understand the experimentation process and needs of the company. In her 3 years at the organization, she has grown from focusing on sales and conversions to solely managing experimentation across the 12 European brand websites and becoming the consumers’ voice within the organization.

Back in 2019, Ilse realized the need for a dedicated A/B Testing platform and led Eastpak to move to VWO in order to sort the challenges they were facing, which were as follows:

The experimentation culture at the organization was mostly outsourced and under-utilized. While there were tests being run, the velocity was missing, as was deriving business applications of these experiments. 

With the changing times, there were a lot of new learnings within the Eastpak team which were earlier marked as ‘gut-feel’. Quantifying them and delving deeper into the user journey was something that was needed to deliver a far more contextual user experience.

Like any other global organization, Eastpak was also swimming in the deep waters of multiple systems, tools, and platforms to integrate into their artillery. Without synergies, it was not only affecting turnaround time but also affecting efficiencies and ultimately the revenue. Add to that the fact that Ilse and her team dealt with 12 European websites across 8 languages at any given point in time. This meant that experience needed to be deployed instantaneously, and hyper-localized across the continent.

In order to drive growth and solve the specific problems that Ilse and the team were facing, they zeroed down on VWO since it not only helped with A/B testing but was also able to analyze and optimize user journeys end-to-end. Add to that VWO’s consultancy wing – VWO Services, they were able to source some of the industry’s best CRO resources driving the A/B testing culture within the organization, all that with the right amount of hand-holding.

And the results are there to see. Earlier, tests were run only on Eastpak’s UK, France, and Italy websites, that too at a limited pace. Now with VWO, not only has the frequency of tests improved, but they are also able to run these across all the websites in Europe with assistance from VWO Services. Take a free trial with VWO to improve your testing velocity.

With the right support system in the shape of VWO Insights and robust reporting, Eastpak UI & UX team has not just been able to double down on the user insights that they want to test out but have also been able to make business decisions that have led to major website improvements. 

With VWO Web Rollouts, the team has been able to tie loose ends on their websites faster and without much dependency on the overworked front-end development team, considering these changes run across different languages and require immediate action. 

In totality, experimentation has come full circle at the organization. There are synergies at scale, multiple ‘task force’ teams (consisting of Merchandisers, Product Managers, Marketing & UI/UX folks) working on specific experimentation projects.

Besides these macro wins for Eastpak, we also discussed few experiments that Ilse’s team were proud of, and in general, can provide inspiration for other experimenters out there:

Stickied Filter Bar

Rationale: VWO Insights showed that only 5% of mobile visitors interacted with the filter bar on Product Landing Pages. The team wanted to ensure customers only see the most relevant product from the vast product range which is why it was important that they notice and use filters.

Hypothesis: By redesigning the mobile filter bar, giving it clear and consistent labels, and making it sticky to the top of the screen would lead to increased filter usage and conversions.

Results: There was an improvement in the interaction with the filters by 106% compared to the Control group. Business-wise, there was a 7% increase in click-through rate, because customers were now more easily able to find relevant products.

Streamlined Check-out Journey

Rationale: VWO Services team suggested that there was an unnecessary extra step within the checkout journey that showed a quick view popup on the mobile shopping cart, and this was causing customer dropout. 

Hypothesis: By removing the extra step and sending customers straight to the shopping cart when clicking the cart icon, there can be an increase in conversion rates.

Results: There was an increase in the click-through rate by 14%, i.e. removing one additional step made it quicker and easier for customers to make a purchase and improved their checkout experience.

With the increased appetite to experiment across all Eastpak websites, Ilse and the team are now considering rehauling the overall product landing structure. With inputs from the VWO Services team, they are moving to a user-centric layout that is far more immersive (including gamification and interaction elements) and customer-centric.

You can read more on optimizing your website for customer experience here. You can also take a free trial with VWO to understand more about how we can aid you on your optimization journey.