For Customer Experience Professionals

Emotional Experience Design

Creating Online Experiences That Deeply Engage Customers

by Ron Rogowski, October 26, 2009

As consumers increasingly look to connect with companies online, lackluster Web experiences will damage many brands. But better functional design won't solve the problem. Instead, Forrester recommends that companies master the three principles of a new . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Interactive Agencies Struggle With Web Usability

by Vidya L. Drego, September 25, 2009

Forrester applied its Web Site Review methodology to 36 reference sites provided by 18 interactive agencies. Only one site received a passing score in our evaluation. The highest numbers of severe failures resulted from poor text legibility, unclear menus, . . .

For Information & Knowledge Management Professionals

What's Holding Back Your Intranet?

Forrester's Web Site Review For Intranets Exposes Barriers To Use And Adoption

by Tim Walters, Ph.D., September 11, 2009

Rapidly changing business environments and sharp competition now make it more important than ever to empower employees with an intranet that makes their work more efficient and productive. At the same time, budget constraints leave no room for guesswork . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Best And Worst Of UK Brand Building Web Sites, 2009: Internet Service Providers

Forrester Applies Its Web Site Brand Review Methodology To The Sites Of Four Top UK Internet Service Providers

by Jonathan Browne, August 27, 2009

How good are the overall experiences offered by leading Internet service providers' Web sites in the UK in 2009? To find out, we graded the sites of four top UK ISP sites using Forrester's Web Site Brand Review methodology. Our tests measure how well . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Persona Best Practices Of Interactive Agencies

Forrester Applies Its Evaluation Methodology To Personas Provided By 18 Large Interactive Agencies

by Vidya L. Drego, August 27, 2009

Forrester applied its persona evaluation criteria to reference personas provided by 18 interactive agencies for the recent Forrester Wave™. Most of the personas showed some room for improvement, with problems running the gamut in both type and severity. . . .

For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

Financial Web Sites Need Customer Service Help

Financial Services eBusiness Customer Service And Support Benchmark, 2009

by Diane Clarkson, Elizabeth Stark, July 31, 2009

As part of a larger analysis of 90 Web sites, Forrester evaluated the availability of online customer service and support among 30 leading financial services Web sites. Forrester found that most sites delivered inconsistent customer service availability, . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Executive Q&A: Cross-Channel Reviews

by Adele Sage, July 31, 2009

Cross-channel reviews uncover flaws that prevent users from accomplishing goals when their paths take them across multiple channels, like Web sites and interactive voice response (IVR) systems. When companies fix these flaws they improve business results. . . .

For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

Multichannel Is Still A Myth For Retailers

Companies Continue To Struggle With Cross-Channel Contact Strategies

by Sucharita Mulpuru, June 29, 2009

Retailers have been striving to provide seamless multichannel shopping experiences in order both to stay ahead of the market in an increasingly interconnected world and to align themselves with consumer multichannel behavior. In a recent report, Forrester . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Best And Worst Of Phone Self-Service Design, 2009

Forrester Applies Its IVR Review Methodology To 16 Major Firms

by Adele Sage, May 20, 2009

Forrester applied its IVR Review methodology to the phone self-service experiences at 16 US firms — four each of the largest auto insurers, discount retailers, footwear manufacturers, and online travel agencies. Among the generally weak phone self-service . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

The State Of Customer Experience, 2009

Customer Experience Management Enters Into Adolescence

by Bruce D. Temkin, April 24, 2009

Executives have been saying for awhile that customer experience is important. Only recently, however, have many of them begun to understand its direct link with loyalty. As a result, companies are starting to develop more disciplined approaches to customer . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Best And Worst Of B2C Site Design, 2009

Forrester Applies Its Web Site Review Methodology To 16 Major Firms

by Adele Sage, April 14, 2009

Forrester applied its Web Site Review methodology to the site experiences at 16 firms — four each of the largest auto insurers, discount retailers, footwear manufacturers, and online travel agencies. While Expedia received the highest score, all 16 sites . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Web Site Reviews: What, Why, And When

An Overview Of The Benefits And Limitations Of Expert Reviews

by Harley Manning, April 9, 2009

During these uncertain economic times it's even more important to satisfy customers by offering them a high-quality Web experience. Web site reviews offer an efficient way to identify — and then remove — usability problems that lead to lost sales and . . .

For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

Case Study: Customer Centricity Drives Esurance's eBusiness Strategy

by Chad Mitchell, March 23, 2009

Over the past decade, US direct insurer Esurance has survived the dot-com bubble while carving out a growing share of the auto insurance market. The firm established itself as a viable challenger brand to direct insurance Goliaths GEICO and Progressive . . .

For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

2008 US Bank Secure Web Site Rankings

Forrester's Competitive Site Assessment Ranks Five Top US Banks

by Emmett Higdon, March 13, 2009

Forrester evaluated the secure Web sites of five of the largest US banks — Bank of America, Citibank, JPMorgan Chase, Wachovia Bank, and Wells Fargo — using our Competitive Site Assessment (CSA) methodology. The Bank of America site led all others — earning . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Best And Worst Of Cross-Channel Design, 2009

Forrester Applies Its Cross-Channel Review Methodology To 16 Major Firms

by Adele Sage, March 6, 2009

Forrester applied its Cross-Channel Review methodology to the experiences at 16 firms — four of the largest auto insurers, discount retailers, footwear manufacturers, and online travel agencies. While Expedia, Nike, and Orbitz received the top overall . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Lessons Learned From 157 Web Site Brand Reviews

Forrester Examines Results From Version 1.0 Of Our Web Site Brand Review Methodology

by Ron Rogowski, February 27, 2009

Forrester recently updated its Web Site Brand Review Methodology to version 2.0. Before moving on, we analyzed the results of 157 Web Site Brand Reviews completed with version 1.0 between June 2005 and October 2008. This data shows that while sites fared . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Executive Q&A: Web Site Brand Reviews, 2009

by Ron Rogowski, February 24, 2009

Web Site Brand Reviews uncover two types of flaws in a Web site's brand experience: those that prevent users from accomplishing key goals and those that contradict a company's brand attributes. To get the most out of a Web Site Brand Review, customer . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Best And Worst Of UK Retailer Privacy Policies

Minor, Low-Cost Changes Can Boost Trust

by Ron Rogowski, January 23, 2009

Consumers worry about the privacy and security of their information when transacting online. But how well do leading companies perform at making their privacy and security policies (PSPs) known to their customers? To find out, Forrester reviewed the top . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Forrester Cross-Channel Review 7.1 Reviewer's Guide (874 KB DOC)

by Adele Sage, January 8, 2009

An update to the Cross-Channel Review Reviewer's Guide.

For Customer Experience Professionals

MP3 Player Manufacturers' Cross-Channel Experience, 2008

An Industry Look At This Year's Best And Worst Of Cross-Channel Design

by Adele Sage, September 9, 2008

As part of a larger analysis of 16 firms, Forrester evaluated the cross-channel experiences of four large US MP3 player manufacturers — Apple, Creative, iRiver, and Sony. As an industry, the MP3 player manufacturers received dismal scores compared with . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Facebook And MySpace Redesign Sites, But Usability Remains Flawed

by Bruce D. Temkin, September 8, 2008

Facebook and MySpace recently redesigned their sites, but Forrester's Web Site Review methodology still uncovered major usability flaws on both. Of the 10 criteria we examined, Facebook passed four and MySpace passed only three. The sites shared some . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Executive Q&A: Web Site Reviews

by Adele Sage, September 5, 2008

Forrester's Web Site Review uncovers flaws that prevent users from accomplishing key goals on Web sites. This document provides answers to some of the common questions we've been asked during more than 1,100 Web Site Reviews. To get the most out of the . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Best And Worst Of UK Site Design, 2008

Forrester Applies Its Web Site Review Methodology To 12 Major Firms

by Marta Baigorri, September 2, 2008

Forrester applied its Web Site Review methodology to the site experiences at 12 firms — three each of the largest newspapers, TV broadcasters, retailers, and wireless providers in the UK. Of all the evaluated sites, only BT achieved a passing score — . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Presidential Candidate Sites Fail Usability

Forrester Applied Its Web Site Review To Obama And McCain Sites

by Bruce D. Temkin, August 28, 2008

Forrester evaluated the usability of the Obama and McCain presidential campaign sites using an abridged version of its Web Site Review methodology. The results were not great: Both sites failed a majority of the criteria we evaluated. Interestingly, both . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

Case Study: How Monster Puts UX At The Heart Of Its New Global Product Development Strategy

by Marta Baigorri, August 26, 2008

In the past eight years, Monster has expanded into more than 50 countries on four continents through an aggressive acquisition program. Even as Monster focused on platform integration, go-to-market strategies, and infrastructure, it neglected user experience . . .