How trueCABLE’s Customer-Centered Mindset Laid The Foundation For An Experimentation Practice
We sat down with the trueCABLE team to understand how staying customer-centered and working with The Good supports their growth goals.
“Understand your customer” is a marketing truism we’ve all heard before. But few companies put it into action like ethernet and fiber optic cable supplier trueCABLE.
At trueCABLE, optimization is a practice, not a program. It’s part of their culture and identity to improve the experience (digital and otherwise) for their shoppers. Optimization is not a one-and-done, check-it-off-the-list task. They aren’t trying to be the cheapest brand. Instead, they focus on serving their customers through great support and a frictionless website experience.
They keep the customer at the center of everything they do. If you’re also aiming for long-term, sustainable success, it’s important to bake a customer-centric mindset into your organization’s DNA.
So, we chatted with Jessica Floyd, VP of Marketing & Business Development, and Mikayla Moulton, Marketing Manager, from the trueCABLE team, to explore their work and what other ecommerce companies can learn about true customer-centrism and user-centered design.
trueCABLE’s Story
trueCABLE started in 2015. Their goal was to disrupt an outdated industry by delivering the fastest, most reliable low-voltage supplies and backing it up with unbelievable customer support. They serve DIYers and professional installers alike.
They certainly don’t skimp on quality. All of their products are designed by experts to exceed industry standards and undergo rigorous testing to ensure they outperform other, more expensive brands.
Unlike other companies that design products to break down and be replaced, trueCABLE uses a customer-centric approach and builds products that will last you years in the field.
They’re so confident in the quality of their products that they offer a Forever Warranty that covers any defects in material and manufacturer’s workmanship for all products, forever.
A Customer-Centered Mindset
trueCABLE has seen tremendous growth over its almost 10 years in business. And that success stems from its team’s philosophy of customer-centered thinking. This approach has been part of the company since the very beginning, long before they even had a website, let alone took deliberate steps to improve their website.
This is why we say optimization is a practice at trueCABLE. They’ve been doing the most critical part of optimization – building for the user – since day one.
Jessica Floyd, VP of Marketing & Business Development, was one of the first employees at trueCABLE, starting in the early days when they only sold on Amazon. She has a background in marketing but works with all of the other departments, making sure the marketing efforts align with customer success, sales, etc.
“Focusing on the customer has been a business strategy since the beginning,” Jessica tells us, “because the things we sell are pretty commoditized.”
Jessica knows the value of serving the customer. She never aimed to compete on price. She uses customer service as one of trueCABLE’s differentiators.
Mikayla Moulton, Marketing Manager, joined the company after Jessica but has experience that is deeply rooted in user-centered thinking as well. She started out in customer success, where she worked on the front lines, making sure customers found the products valuable. She brings a unique, customer-centric attitude to the marketing team.
“Without our customers, there is no trueCABLE,” says Mikayla. “Thanks to my time in customer success, I’ve been able to understand the issues customers face, whether that’s on our website or with the products. I saw how loyal they became when we solved their problems.”
This mindset is the foundation of their work. It all starts with listening to the shoppers. The feedback informs changes on their site and to their products, with the goal of saving future customers from similar challenges.
And it doesn’t stop with the marketing team. trueCABLE has buy-in from its leadership because, at the end of the day, that is where the root of customer-centrism lives. The whole team sees the value of user research and testing. With the addition of The Good’s research, data collection methods, and counsel, they continue evolving their approach to make more informed decisions that serve their shoppers.
A Culture of Experimentation
Another pillar of Jessica and Mikayla’s success has been their willingness to challenge assumptions and take risks. This is made easier by having leadership that’s aligned with the experimentation ethos and filters that philosophy throughout the organization.
This matches our findings, as well. When we studied hundreds of successful optimization teams, we learned that they all had strong leadership buy-in. This is why buy-in is a big part of our 5-Factors Scorecard™.
Risk-taking has always been a part of trueCABLE. The CEO, John, has always been willing to take calculated risks.
“You know the saying, ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it?’ That doesn’t apply at trueCABLE. Things move so quickly with ecommerce and digital marketing that you have to keep moving. That’s how we keep ahead, by experimenting and trying new things.”
– Jessica Floyd, VP of Marketing & Business Development
But that risk-taking has to fall within the scope of their customer-centered mindset. All tests and experiments must pass through the lens of “Is this good for the customer?”
The challenge is that this can often lead to hasty implementations based on just one piece of feedback. While trueCABLE had a practice of talking to users and making user-centered decisions, they wanted to make sure their hunches were correct by testing them. This led them to The Good.
trueCABLE and The Good
“When we found The Good, we were excited to finally have the data to back up changes we were making on the website.”
Mikayla Moulton, Marketing Manager
“Now, with our marketing, we’re either testing beforehand or pulling data before we launch to make sure that our efforts are actually getting results. That is something we have focused on since working with The Good,” says Mikayla.
For instance, they learned that building a site for two distinct audience groups – B2C and B2B customers – can make the relationship between conversion rate and revenue a bit hazy. A large B2B order can affect test results that must be accounted for.
“Understanding this helped me a lot,” says Mikayla. “That’s something I can keep in mind when I’m looking at other test results in marketing and other departments.”
In another case, Jessica and Mikayla discovered that their customers prefer long-form technical details in product descriptions, even if large sections of text make their pages look less aesthetic.
“We learned that users like to have all of that information,” Jessica says. “Information like that is helpful because we can use it in other parts of our marketing messaging and strategy.”
This finding went against a common ecommerce convention that less is better on product pages. Variants with less text in the hero area lost significantly to the version with more text (pictured below).
Listening to trueCABLE’s unique users instead of going with “the norm” or gut instinct paid off big time.
In an earlier version of their site, the collection pages contained the same products but in as many as 10 different colors. It was messy and cumbersome to sort through.
After working with The Good, they truncated the color selection to display a small group of colors with a “+” sign to indicate there were more options. This made their collection pages cleaner and easier to use. “This change performed really well. It’s been a big win for us,” Jessica says.
Going forward, Jessica and Mikayla are smart not to silo their learnings. The organization’s 28 team members benefit from the learnings of the Marketing team – especially sales and customer success – which compounds the value of their tests. This is one of the reasons why understanding the customer is so important: Everyone in the organization can use it to optimize their domain.
“It helps [the other teams] understand the customer journey,” says Jessica. “I’ll let them know what customers are looking for on the website. It helps everyone do their jobs better.” They use this knowledge and other insights from website improvements to inform ad copy, customer service language, and more.
Focus on Your Unique Users
Jessica, Mikayla, and the team at trueCABLE have done the work to build a quality digital experience for their customers. Now, they serve as a great example for other ecommerce brands of the importance of staying user-centered and valuing optimization for improvements in the business and the user experience.
Many companies feel they are lacking the competencies needed to build an effective optimization program. But trueCABLE’s story goes to show that being a lean team doesn’t have to prevent you from making a big impact. You don’t even need to have all the core competencies in-house. You just need a customer-centered mindset and a great partner to help you actualize the vision.
Hiring a team like The Good can help product marketing and ecommerce leaders create a practice that delivers better digital experiences for your users and your bottom line.
Ready to get started? Let us help you harness user insights and unlock improvements beyond your conversion rate. We’ll create a custom program that unlocks the full potential of your website, app, or digital product. Learn more about the Digital Experience Optimization Program™.
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About the Author
Caroline Appert
Caroline Appert is the Director of Marketing at The Good. She has proven success in crafting marketing strategies and executing revenue-boosting campaigns for companies in a diverse set of industries.