Project
The evolution of the contact experience
company
Trade Me
Category
[Design]
Year
2021
The redesign of ‘contact us’ was the next challenge we tackled as part of the redesign of support at Trade Me. Our contact form was made of only 2 fields, and all the requests would go to the same queue to then be sorted to the right teams internally. We needed to find a way to be able to direct these tickets to the right team so we could improve efficiency and reduce wait times.
Our first go at redesigning ‘contact us’ was to try and make it as conversational as possible. We tried to make it into sentences that the users would be able to change the end part and make it into a paragraph.
We tested a few different versions, and the reactions to it varied a lot. We had people who could easily navigate and find the answers to their problems, and people who couldn’t work out how to use and would just be even more frustrated. That taught us one of the most important lessons: Help is the only part of Trade Me where people go not because they want, but because they need. We need to make it as easy as possible for them.
We then realised we needed product principles to help guide our work. We ran a few workshops with our team to understand what these principles should be, and got to these: • Flow comes first We don’t force changes to our users for the sake of it, we respect their way of doing things. • Effective within constraints We are small but mighty, we know our constraints and make the most effective changes within these. • Clear is kind We show our customers kindness by being clear about the ‘how, when and why’. • Enable adaptability Our solutions aren’t static and can adapt with time and without additional dev work. • Show the path to support A fast and helpful experience is the main priority. A few more steps may need to be taken but the user benefit is worth it.
We then went back to the drawing board and decided we should keep it simple and straightforward. Supported by our new product principles, we decided we would use Zendesk’s natural style of forms, and adapted slightly to make it fit into our IA structure. We also added all the contact forms we have down the bottom of the page, and made it configurable so our teams could change it based on their needs.
Josie Conijn - Sr. Product Manager Jimmy Corbishley - Engineer Jonathan Brown - Engineer Ern Wong - QA Engineer Noeli Tortul - Engineering Lead + Trust and Safety and Customer Support