Jayman BUILT is a leading home builder in Calgary and Edmonton, Alberta. They have specialized in new home construction, sustainable building practices and energy-efficient design for over 40 years.

Jayman BUILT's website has always been an afterthought compared to its quality customer service. How can the website be enhanced to provide the most value to Alberta homebuyers?

Working alongside a Senior UX Researcher, we conducted a comprehensive study—including moderated user interviews and unmoderated competitive testing—to understand how and where jayman.com is used by their customers.

We listened to recent homebuyers👂🏼

🔎 What factors did they consider when choosing a new-build?

We held hour-long interviews on Zoom with 12 Jayman BUILT customers who purchased a single-family home within the last three months. Participants fell into one of these personas: First-timers, Move-ups, Investors, and Downsizers.

🔎 What information or features on the Jayman website, if any, influenced their decision to purchase a new-build home?

🔎 Why did buyers choose Jayman to purchase their new-build home over other competitors?

Interview Analysis

Research results showed room for improvement.

We discovered that users compare home options across multiple sites, sometimes in the same browsing session. We conducted 27 competitive user tests comparing the Jayman BUILT mobile experience with its top competitors to evaluate performance across the following tasks:

• First impressions of the homepage
• Finding a home model
• Finding information to visit the home

Check out how Jayman BUILT scored against others. Competitor names are redacted for privacy.

Contrary to initial belief, the Jayman BUILT website came into play multiple times throughout the buying journey.

Valuable insights led to business investment 💸

✔️ The addition of a photo gallery page

✔️ Redesign homepage

✔️ Restructure and redesign the navigation

✔️ Improve usability on carousel component

✔️ Redesign home details page

After presenting our research findings to the Jayman BUILT C-suite, my team received approval on the following UX recommendations. We recommended enhancements to align the website with users' needs and expectations.

User research proved that the website was vital to the modern home buyer.

Restructuring the navigation to fit users' mental models.

A new website menu was an opportunity to reinforce Jayman BUILT's leadership in sustainable home building. The website hadn’t fully reflected their long-standing initiatives or how users viewed them relative to competitors. I went through about 10 iterations of the site map before my team began tree testing.

"Sustainability" is a brand new section of existing content to promote Jayman BUILT's differentiating factor in the market.

Screenshot from the navigation live on jayman.com

Wireframing new wayfinding.

This wayfinding was meant to solve an ongoing issue identified by the client—the first few rows of the homes listing page were all condos; this was not a good look for someone who had triple the budget.

We learned from the research that a majority of users know what home style/type they are interested in before they shop around, therefore, making that initial selection will allow them to have a personalized listing page.

Here's a slide directly out of a client presentation that provided design options as mid-fidelity wires.

A screenshot of the final design from https://www.jayman.com/all-homes/

Final home listing page

Refined by the Creative Director + Graphic Designer

"Service Design must deliver a coherent experience across all channels and touchpoints."

— Thomas A. Stewart & Patricia O'Connell from "Woo, Wow, and Win"
Service Design, Strategy, and the Art of Customer Delight, 2016

Going forward

Given the opportunity, I would have liked to explore in-person services as well, to gain a holistic understanding and provide recommendations on the full home-buying experience with Jayman BUILT.

In addition to our website updates, Jayman BUILT has implemented a digital personalization tool for home exterior options. This was a direct ask from home buyers. It’s very rewarding to see user needs materialize.

Banner image courtesy of Jayman BUILT.

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