Introducing ZSL

The Zoological Society of London (ZSL) is a charity devoted to the worldwide conservation of animals and their habitats. ZSL’s scientists, veterinarians and animal management teams at London Zoo and Whipsnade Zoo bring a wealth of skills and experience to practical conservation and the scientific research that underpins it.

The challenge

The principle objectives for the ZSL website redesign were to create a brighter and more inviting feel within a wider screen format, review and refine the user experience, improve the checkout process to increase conversion rates and implement instant online animal adoptions (the charity’s first completely web-fulfilled fundraising package). ZSL has a website rich in content therefore it was also important to make effective use of space and design an intuitive information architecture that seamlessly guided users on their journeys. It was also important that the user experience should not be disjointed when interacting with different areas of the site. Thus if a visitor buys tickets or registers for a newsletter they shouldn’t have to register again to adopt an animal or make a donation. Herein lies a complex project. The integration of the many ticketing, ecommerce, social and crm systems had to be carefully planned and delivered.

What we did

Delivering a full redesign allowed us to revisit ZSL’s information architecture and navigation structure. User experience was central to this process, with audiences and website statistics analysed to identify trends in user behaviour. Simultaneously we ran workshops with ZSL to identify the charity’s objectives for the site. From this intelligence, prototypes for the navigation were testing prior to the build, with further user testing towards the end of the project honing the experience further.

To increase conversion rates, we designed a user friendly single page checkout which allows users to buy gifts or make donations in just four easy steps. To speed up the process we implemented postcode look-up technology and removed forced pre-registration. We also integrated 3D Secure payment screens into checkout, rather than taking users to the external 3D Secure site to maximise conversion. Behind the scenes, we used web services to talk to ZSL’s multiple systems: including ticketing, membership, retail and CRM.

The results

Online ticket sales and animal adoptions have proved extremely popular with the public: they now represent a huge revenue stream for ZSL. Average order value has grown consistently from 2008 to 2010, while the number of actual orders has increased due to a higher conversion rate. Visitors have also stayed consistently high over the last two years.