Have you recently used the Domino’s Pizza website to order a pie?  I did the other night and it’s a wonderful experience in website usability.  There is much that can be learned and applied to your law firm website in terms of the core components that made the site so good.

There are 3 main components I’ve identified that made it a great experience.

1. It was easy to use and didn’t make me think too hard about what I was doing.

2. It was fun to use.

3. It delivered on the experience promised and made me want to go back again.

The Experience

It was easy to use and didn’t make me think too hard about what I was doing.

When you arrive on the site and want to order a pizza to be delivered, the Order button is prominently displayed on the menu in the upper left. I didn’t have to search too hard for it. Once I clicked it, a modal box opened immediately, prompting me for my address to be connected with the closest location. Once I entered my address it took me right to the menu to start placing my order. I noticed right away how much better this was than simply giving me a listing of nearby locations and making me decide which one was the best to order from. Or worse, trying to figure out which location delivered to my area out of several. Truth is, that’s their problem. Just let me order and you take care of routing my order to proper location for delivery. This is exactly what they do and the result is that my experience is less cumbersome and I don’t have to think very much to take the action they want me to.

Is your law firm site easy to use like this? Do you make your customers think too much? Is you contact info easy to see? If you have multiple locations, do you make it easy for them to know which one is best to contact? Do you make it easy for users to accomplish the tasks you encourage and want them to take such as calling you or filing out a request for a case evaluation?

It was fun to use

My favorite part of the order was when I created the pizza. You can choose from several options on the menu, but when you create a pizza, a picture of your little piece of pizza dough appears when you first start. As you add ingredients to your pizza the picture updates in real time to show you how your pizza now looks. I actually added a few ingredients I didn’t want just to mess around and see what the pizza looked like. I took them off, but it was fun and made me smile. The experience became enjoyable and different from other food sites I’ve ordered from.

Does your firm’s site contain any elements of your website that are different and make users want to come back? It can be something more simple than the above example, but the key is that you are engaging you audience and providing a forum for interaction. Users that are interacting and engaged are more likely to become clients.

It delivered on the experience promised and made me want to go back again.

After I built my pizza and submitted my credit card information, an email was shot over to me confirming my order and receipt. The site took me to a live update of my pizza creation. Step by step it told me in real time the status of my pizza and the name of the person creating it. It told me as it was getting toppings, going in the oven, getting a final inspection, and in route to my place. Five minutes after the site updated telling me my order was being delivered, my doorbell rang. Great experience for me as the end user.

Do you offer transparency to your potential clients as to what is going on when they contact you through your site? Do you send an automated email to let them know when they can expect a call or email? Do you offer something personalized for them (such as the name of my pizza maker) so you become a person they are doing business with rather than “just another faceless firm.”

Great things to think about.

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