Research
The Research
I began by outlining and evaluating every possible function on the Contact page. This included the modifiable contact form with every option, as well as the included mailing address, and links to email First Opinion Article submissions and redirect to the Team page.
It was important to evaluate what each task is accomplishing, and reorganize them to better suit how each task can be grouped.
Goals:
- How many base options are there for subjects of contact?
- How is each option similar or different from the rest?
- How does each option modify the rest of the form fields?
- At what point in the online experience would a user want to contact and why?
- How easily can a user's reason for contact be anticipated and solved beforehand?
Discoveries
I discovered the best way to approach the redesign was to develop more than one page to separate out the "STAT+" subscription model, which required contact for negotiating Enterprise level accounts. This could be reorganized along the same flow as signing up for the other standardized models.
Additional functions that the original design featured was a redirect to a Team page, as well as opening up a separate email form for Opinion article submissions. As such, these functions were separated into subheaders for the main contact page, to help better organize reasons for contact into categories of reaching a specific employee, general contact inquiries, and Article submission.
Finally, I determined that since Questions & Comments / STAT+ Assistance were the most likely to be selected categories, a FAQ Page that could troubleshoot and answer common questions would be effective in empowering users and reducing the need for unnecessary contact.