Ocado Technology · Customer insight and product direction
A product team wanted to help customers recover special offers they had not completed by introducing a new page at checkout. Research showed that, for many customers, checkout was already too late. I helped the team understand where the confusion began and redirect the work towards clearer guidance earlier in the shopping journey.
The proposal
The original idea was to introduce a page at checkout showing customers offers they had not completed. It was a logical response, but it assumed customers had understood the offer while shopping and had simply forgotten or decided not to complete it.
What the research revealed
Research showed the checkout page could help customers who changed their mind. But many believed the offer was already complete when they added products to their basket, so checkout was too late to prevent the misunderstanding.
The important question was not whether the checkout page could work. It was whether checkout was the right place to solve the problem.
Reframing the problem
The proposed page addressed recovery. The research showed that a larger opportunity lay in preventing the misunderstanding before it happened.
Initial framing
This focused the team on a final opportunity to correct an incomplete offer before purchase.
Research-informed framing
This moved the focus to the moment customers were making decisions and forming their understanding of the offer.
Choosing the right moment
Mapping both approaches against the shopping journey made the shift clear: recovery at checkout versus prevention while customers were choosing products.
Notice promotions and decide which offers are relevant.
Choose qualifying items and understand what is still required.
Research directionContinue shopping with a clearer view of progress towards the offer.
Review the order and resolve anything still outstanding.
Original proposalThe research shifted the focus from recovering missed offers at checkout to preventing misunderstanding when customers added products.
Turning insight into direction
The value of the work was not simply identifying confusion. It was separating different customer behaviours and giving the team a more useful problem to solve.
I examined whether the checkout concept addressed the reasons customers failed to complete offers, rather than evaluating the page in isolation.
The findings distinguished customers who changed their mind from those who believed they had already met the offer requirements.
I worked with the Discovery team to focus on improving understanding when customers added products to their basket.
The outcome
The team shifted from recovering failures at checkout to preventing confusion earlier in the journey.
The research gave stakeholders confidence to move beyond the original page request and focus on the point where customers formed their understanding of an offer. This created a clearer basis for improving the experience without adding a late-stage solution that only helped part of the problem.
What made the work useful
The aim of helping customers save money remained valid. The research tested whether the proposed page was the best way to achieve it.
Customers who changed their mind needed a different response from customers who misunderstood what the offer required.
Clearer guidance was more useful while customers were choosing products than after the misunderstanding had already occurred.