Increasing Site Conversion
A research-driven modernisation of Warner Hotels resulting in a +8.2% increase in overall site conversion rates and a significant boost in revenue per user.
Warner Hotels was facing challenges with its outdated, slow, and unreliable website. An external agency had delivered initial designs and partial user journeys, but significant gaps remained. The project was to be delivered in three stages, with the first phase focusing on redesigning the website to improve search functionality and discoverability.
As Lead UX Designer I was tasked with addressing the gaps in the existing project and ensuring the successful completion of all three phases — reworking the initial design to better align with business objectives, scoping the remaining phases, and delivering a user-friendly, future-proof website.
- Conducted a thorough review of the existing work, identifying insufficient user journeys and layouts misaligned with business goals.
- Performed a competitor analysis to benchmark best practices and identify features to integrate into the WLH website.
- Expanded and refined the Information Architecture to cover all possible user interactions.
- Reworked critical wireframes, focusing on usability and conversion optimisation.
- Developed interactive prototypes of key sections and conducted user testing to gather immediate feedback.
- Iterated on designs based on user feedback, refining wireframes and prototypes to resolve usability issues.
- Provided detailed documentation of refined designs, user journeys, IA, and prototypes to the development team.
- Maintained ongoing collaboration with developers, conducting continuous user testing to make real-time adjustments.
- Conducted extensive pre-release testing including a broad survey sent to 36,000 existing guests, achieving a 16% completion rate.
- Analysed survey results and testing data to identify areas for improvement, added to the backlog for post-launch follow-up.
- Successfully launched the new WLH website with minimal disruption to traffic.
- Monitored post-launch performance noting a +8.2% increase in overall site conversion rate and a boost in revenue per user.
The WLH website redesign was a successful modernisation effort resulting in a +8.2% increase in overall site conversion rates and a significant improvement in revenue per user. The project demonstrated the value of research-driven, user-centric design. Some challenges — including a shift in user behaviour and decreased search effectiveness — were identified post-launch and prioritised for ongoing optimisation.