JD.com Full usability scan

Background

JD.com, also known as Jingdong, is one of the two massive online retailers in China. It is a major competitor to Alibaba-run Tmall. In 2016, JD.com expanded outside of China and launched its Russia online store. As a newcomer to the Russian market, JD.com enlisted Touch to conduct a full usability scan in order to understand how the current website helps Russian people to shop online. Thanks to previous international project experience, Touch is connected to reputed partners in more than ten emerging markets including Russia, Indonesia, The Philippines and India, which not only helps us ensure that projects run smoothly but also allows us to overcome language barriers and collect authentic feedback.

Touch is connected to reputed partners in more than 10 emerging markets including Russia, Indonesia, Philippines and India

Challenge

International usability testing is the art of localizing a product to fit the customs and linguistic standards of other countries. Performing localization user testing will ensure that companies have customized the interface to fit the preferences of the target audience. Getting user feedback from international participants will allow companies to expand globally and experience exponential growth.

The biggest challenge for running an international usability test for JD.com was to receive authentic feedback. This involved recruiting representative participants, getting them involved, and enabling them to fully express themselves.

Performing localization-user testing will ensure companies have customized the interface to fit the preferences of the target audience.

Achievements

Touch was able to capture the user experience concerns in three areas.

1. The localization of language, forms, and capabilities such as payment methods. For example, address requirements are different in Russia.

2. Unique culture that influences perceived values. For example, the value of e-commerce in Russia can be different in terms of warranty and shipping policies.

3. Browsing behavior. This goes beyond being able to place an order.

Applying our e-commerce usability framework, Touch clustered all of the issues and prioritized them according to usability measurements.

Tools

Touch employed the user journey map as our key framework throughout the entire project. The tool is used not only in designing UX tasks for participants, but also in further analysis and the sharing process.

By putting purchasing actions into five major steps, JD.com was able to identify key barriers that helped explain the usage data.