# BT Outdoors

## Summary
BT Outdoors began as a fast first-launch e-commerce site built with standard patterns, then was redesigned once customer behavior showed those patterns were mismatched to actual purchase intent. The resulting experience shifted from discovery-first browsing to retrieval-focused product access.

## Metadata
- Role: Product Designer (End-to-End)
- Platform: Web (CMS)
- Scope: Direct-to-consumer experience
- Timeline: Initial Launch: 2 weeks; Redesign: 1 month
- Audience: Existing and returning customers arriving with specific products in mind
- Status: Not explicitly stated in portfolio source

## Key Concepts
- The initial launch followed conventional e-commerce patterns optimized for discovery.
- Customers were high-intent and expected direct access to known products.
- The redesign had to evolve the live system rather than replace it.
- The homepage was reframed as a launch point for intent, not a showroom for browsing.
- Category-first navigation and simplified terminology reduced friction to product.
- Revenue doubled within one year after the redesign.

## Full Content

### Overview

I was initially brought on to design and launch their first website quickly, using standard e-commerce patterns to get the business online.

The first version shipped in two weeks.

Six months later, despite strong traffic from existing customers, the site was underperforming.

### The first pass

The initial version followed conventional e-commerce patterns:

- Homepage structured around discovery and promotion
- Layered category navigation
- Product browsing optimized for exploration

This approach assumed browsing behavior. With a two-week timeline, I relied on familiar e-commerce patterns to ship quickly.

### What broke

Despite directing Amazon customers to the site, customers continued purchasing through Amazon instead.

Customer behavior revealed a mismatch:

- Users weren't browsing
- Users arrived with specific products in mind
- Users expected direct access, not exploration

What worked for general e-commerce didn't work here. The system forced high-intent users into low-intent flows.

### Constraints

The redesign had to evolve the existing system rather than replace it.

- The site was already live with active customers
- Product structure and inventory were already in place
- The catalog spanned over 1,400 SKUs across 500+ products
- The platform limited how deeply the backend could be restructured
- Familiarity needed to be maintained for repeat buyers

These constraints required simplifying the experience within the system, not rebuilding it from scratch.

### Path to product

The homepage needed to function as a launch point for intent, not a showroom for browsing. The redesign focused on compressing the path from entry to product.

From the homepage, users needed to:

- Enter directly into a known category
- View relevant products immediately
- Move toward checkout with minimal navigation

The objective was to reduce the path to product from 3-4 interactions to 1-2.

| Before | After |
| --- | --- |
| Homepage | Homepage |
| All Products | Category |
| Category | Product |
| Subcategory |  |
| Product |  |
| 4-5 steps | 1-2 steps |

### Structural shift

After defining a clear path to product, I shifted the site from a discovery-first experience to a retrieval-focused one.

Category structures and navigation were aligned with how customers actually think about products, using familiar terminology, accounting for brand affinity, and accommodating overlapping product groupings rather than strict taxonomy.

Decisions: I surfaced primary product categories directly on the homepage, replaced promotional modules with category-first navigation, simplified terminology, and reduced hierarchy depth to minimize steps to product.

Outcome: Users could move directly from entry to product without navigating layered category structures, reducing friction between intent and action.

### Final result

The redesigned experience aligned the site with actual customer behavior. Users could reach products in as little as one click from the homepage.

The result was a measurable shift in performance. Within a year, site revenue doubled, driven by improved conversion from existing traffic.

## Key Decisions
- Reframed the homepage around intent and direct product entry rather than discovery.
- Surfaced primary product categories directly on the homepage.
- Replaced promotional modules with category-first navigation.
- Simplified terminology to match customer language.
- Reduced hierarchy depth to minimize steps to product.

## Outcome
The redesign aligned the site with actual customer behavior, reduced the path to product to as little as one click from the homepage, and doubled site revenue within one year.