Where’s my stuff? From the moment an order is placed, people want to know the status of their purchase and when they’re going to get it. Mattress Firm, one of the largest mattress retailers in the United States, wanted to give customers a way to find out. Working with one other UX designer, I designed Mattress Firm’s and delivery tracking site and customer email notifications.
To cost-effectively deliver a large item like a mattress, Mattress Firm manages their own fleet of delivery trucks, manages nationwide warehouses, contracts with freight operators and shares delivery tracking across their distribution network. In the backend, orders flow from Demandware (their e-commerce platform), to Microsoft Dynamics AX (where product information is managed), then onto SAP ATP to manage inventory, regional availability and delivery appointments. Once a delivery appointment is made, they utilize DispatchTrack to manage logistics and interface with the customer. Smaller items on the same order are shipped via FedEx or UPS, and must be shown to the customer in the same interface.
Users don’t care about all that. They just want to know where their stuff is, and when they’re going to get it. To create a user-oriented experience, my partner and I researched the APIs for each platform, reviewed customer feedback comments, looked at best practices, and performed competitive analysis to understand user expectations and find opportunities for improvement.
The solution focuses on letting customers know where they’re at in the delivery process, what to expect (with FAQs and videos), and what’s going happen next. And to add a little delight, animated gifs accompany the emails for each stage.
