Taking Flight: How Qantas Soars to UX Excellence with Optimal
Australia's flagship carrier
Qantas, Australia's flagship carrier, partnered with Optimal to transform their digital customer experience. By leveraging Optimal's user insight capabilities, Qantas gained crucial feedback about their brand perception, online navigation paths, and payment options. The result? A more intuitive booking process, stronger brand positioning, and improved customer satisfaction across their digital touchpoints.
The Challenge: Turbulence in the Digital Journey
Let's face it—the airline industry is incredibly competitive, and Qantas knew their digital experience needed to be top-notch. They were facing some real hurdles:
- Uncertainty about how customers perceived their brand and product offerings
- Complex website navigation that was potentially causing booking abandonment
- Confusion around payment options during the checkout process
With millions of customers visiting their digital platforms each month, even small improvements could yield massive returns. They needed data, not guesswork, to guide their decisions.
The Solution: Optimal's UX Toolkit Takes Off
Qantas turned to Optimal to get inside their customers' heads. Here's how they put Optimal's research platform to work:
Brand Perception at 30,000 Feet: Strategic Card Sorting
Qantas conducted comprehensive card sorting studies to understand how customers categorized and perceived their various service offerings and brand elements. This wasn't just about website organization—it was about understanding the mental models customers had about Qantas as a brand.
Long-Haul Navigation Testing: Years of Continuous Improvement
Qantas maintained multiple navigation studies running over several years, each with hundreds of participants. This long-term approach allowed them to track changes in user behavior over time and make continuous improvements to their booking flow.
Demystifying Payments: Card Sorting the Checkout Experience
The final step of booking—payment—is often where customers abandon their carts. Qantas used Optimal's card sorting tools to analyze how customers understood the various payment methods available, helping to identify confusing terminology and opportunities to streamline the payment process.
Results: A Smoother Journey from Browse to Booking
Qantas' investment in Optimal's research tools paid off in multiple ways:
- Brand Clarity Takes Off: The card sorting studies revealed key insights about how customers perceived Qantas' offerings, leading to refined messaging that better aligned with customer expectations and an improvement in brand perception metrics.|
- Navigation That Guides, Not Confuses: The years-long navigation testing allowed Qantas to create intuitive pathways through their website. The result? A reduction in abandoned bookings and a decrease in the time it takes customers to complete a reservation.
- Payment Options Made Crystal Clear: After reorganizing their payment options based on card sorting results, Qantas saw an increase in first-attempt checkout completions and significantly reduced customer support queries about payment methods.
Conclusion
Qantas' partnership with Optimal showcases the power of continuous, data-driven UX research. By making user research a long-term commitment rather than a one-off project, they've created a digital experience that truly resonates with their customers.
The airline industry may be about moving people physically around the world, but Qantas proved that understanding how people move through digital spaces is just as crucial to success. With Optimal's tools providing actionable insights, Qantas has positioned themselves as a leader not just in the skies, but in digital customer experience as well.
Want to learn how you can get started gathering meaningful user insight? Reach out to us today.
