Problem
The existing version of Custom Quotes was overdue for a redesign.
At Zillow, our Custom Quotes product had several issues that we confirmed by conducting user research and looking at site metrics:
It had a very high bounce rate because the information was overwhelming.
Users contacted lenders on outdated quotes because they didn't realize they could customize results by entering their own information (the page loaded with pre-filled values).
There's also an educational component that was missing. A large percentage of users were under the impression that anyone could qualify for the rates advertised. But in reality, mortgage rates depend on many personal factors, such as credit score, loan amount, down payment and more, which our product did not explain clearly.
Finally, there are many users who just visit this page to check rates. So we needed a way to give them what they want, and have a clear path for users who would convert into customers.
Solution
I worked with my UX designer, PM and developers on a redesign of the product. After several rounds of brainstorming, we decided on a solution that would include a landing page that would give rate-curious browsers the latest rates and provide a clear path for users who want custom rates. This path would guide and educate to encourage users to enter their personal details, which would give them accurate results. Once they see their results, they would be streamlined, less confusing, and have labels to indicate which results were the best choice (within the legal limits that we were allowed).
My work on this project included:
Brainstorming on best solutions with my UX designer, PM and engineers.
Writing all the content for the rate table results page: Labels indicating the best loan choice, column headers, help text, error messages and legal disclaimers.
Coordinating with and incorporating several rounds of edits from the legal team to ensure legal compliance.
Planning and writing unique and dynamic below-the-fold content for 10 different landing experiences based on loan type and location. More details on that below.
Below-the-Fold Content for SEO
One of the main challenges for this redesign was that we had 9 versions of our Custom Quotes product based on loan type, and a ton of versions based on location (51 state-specific versions and thousands of city-specific versions).
Additionally, our main source of traffic was SEO, so it was very important for our new landing pages to rank at least as well as the previous versions. So I came up with a 11 content components that could be used across the landing pages, making sure the majority were dynamically generated so that each page would have unique content.
I partnered with our SEO manager to target the right keywords, worked with my UX designer to make sure everything looked great in her mocks, and wrote all of the content. To the right is the spreadsheet I used to track which content went on each page. And below is some sample below-the-fold content:
Results
I'm happy to share that our redesign was a success! Here's a look at the numbers:
Average time on page increased by 2.7%
Bounce rate decreased by 6.6%
SEO rankings improved from 8 to 6
Contacts increased by 30% which resulted in +$4.8m annual revenue