How can Google help improve the grocery shopping experience of users?

Why does google want to improve the grocery shopping experience? – they aim to organise world’s information and make it useful.

Their strengths are very storng alogs to search, gather data and then convert it into meaningful information for the user.

Now,

So, to understand the problem statement better – Google wants to improve the grocery shopping exp for online / app users or in store exp?

Are there any geo restrictions?

What is meant by improve the shopping experience? If we say the overall shopping exp that means, the ability to find the items , do a smooth checkout, not a very long wait time at the counter(in case of store) or smooth payment and offers in case of online.

I will pick up online store shopping exp for mobile because that is the place where a lot of traction is now.

Thinking of online users – there are different types of users or customer persona

Ø  New users , who do not usually buy online

Ø  Mixed users – who do both on line ( like mast minute) and offline shopping

Ø  Power users – those who buy everything online and don’t like to go to offline stores. They are super busy people and don’t have time to visit off line stores.

Among these two, I will prioritise the second group – as I think there is scope to move them to power users , if the grocery shopping experience is very good.

By going through the user journey, we can identify the places where user might be facing issues:

Ø  Usually user has a list of items that they need to get ( like a grocery list)

Ø  They go to an app, start finding the items – issues here that some of the items might be missing or there is a particular brand which is not available

Ø  It is also possible that the prices at this app are inflated for some item

Ø  Add the items to the cart. Possible issues are that it goes out of stock after adding.

Ø  Not enough good offers

Ø   

Among the mentioned issues, I think the ones which are of high priority are –

Ø  Issues in finding some of the items on the list.

Ø  Not finding the right price

Google can make best use of it strong algo in providing a solution for these issues:

Ø  It can have a platform, where users can maintain their grocery list and when they decide to buy, it can suggest the nearby stores and apps from where all the items are available. If there are multiple options it can give a price comparison.

Ø  For offline stores, it can integrate with the maps and suggest the traffic time and the waiting time at the store for the users to make an informed decision.

Ø  There could be voice integration as well for a good experience.

Ø  In the additional features, may be be users can suggest the dish that they want to make and it can get the list of ingredients and then suggest the app/nearby store from where everything can be procured.

1 and 2 are high impact and high priority and I think it will be prudent to go ahead with these features for MVP.

It is required to track the following for the success:

Ø  Number of users using this feature per week

Ø  Number of returning users for the feature

1. Clarifying questions
   1. Just to understand this question better so I need to come up with what can be the soln. or feature that 'Google' can come up with to improve grocery shopping experience? yes
   2. So google here, is it a specific google product like search or any other product being talked about or this is more generic - you need to decide
   3. Any specific app or web experience that u want me to look into - lets say improve mobile experience as that is where most users are.
   4. Location or geo? generic not specific to location.
   5. In store or online experience? you can choose ok so I'll assume google is trying to improve in store shopping experience for big grocery shopping store chains like metro, Reliance, Hyper market. Since in online we already have lots of apps to streamline shopping experience.  And this is for big metropolitan cities where we have such stores.
   6. Any objective or goal that google is trying to meet over here? reason for improving this experience? improve engagement, usage of google platform by improving shopping experience.
   7. Grocery means shopping for cereals, pulses, raw materials for preparing food, beverages, canned food, utensils, daily use items includes soaps etc. Is this fine? yes

2. Now since we are clear on the problem statement, lets look at the user groups that will face this problem
   1. Based on number of items they buy
      1. Buying <7-10 items (small group, bachelors or near by folks who just doing last min shopping)
      2. Buying monthly groceries for their home
         1. early old aged people - who like to choose each and every product, have the time in hand and consider this has their days task so have time at hand.
         2. Super busy working individuals with kids who want to quickly get done but are interested in offers, want to see and buy thus don't shop online but don't have the time.
3. Prioritize user groups for our product, i'll prioritize thse super busy working professionals who don't have time since they are bigger category, they are young and easier to adopt and try out new experiences so can fit as early adopters to the experience we are trying to design.
4. Pain points for the prioritized user group
   1. How to find a parking lot since they are doing monthly shopping so would end up coming on a weeknd so stores are crowded. [Severity - not high, ususally parking lots now have lights to indicate available parking so u can spot the parking, if u plan ur time u will find parking, impact - low]
   2. How to remember the items they want to buy so that they don't miss out on items [severity - med but can be mitigated using multiple listing solutions available like google keep, whatsapp shared groups]
   3. Where to find which product, over the month rack placement of some or the other item changed. [severity - high, reach - might impact new users more than old regular ones, they don't get purturbed by this]
   4. Inventory for the item is not available [severity - high, reach - med. rare use case in a large store. u have inventory unless the product has been discontinued]
   5. How to quickly look for good offers to decide on product to pick in case brand does not matter. [severity - med, reach - med]
   6. Picked all the goods stuck in long checkout queues. how to streamline checkout since it is tiring to stand in queues after walking for 20-30 mins in long isles, kids also cranky after so much of shopping. [severity - high, reach - high big stores have 10s of checkout counters but with 40-50 items to be manually checked out even 3 people ahead of u is going to take atleast half an hour]
5. Prioritization criteria for pain points based on severity of pain point and reach of pain point. So based on the above pain points, i'll select pain point f.
6. Let me think of solutions to address the painpoint
   1. Provide a self checkout solution where items kept by the user in the shopping cart added to user checkout and then before existing the shop they need to pay for those many items. [cost - high since google does not have such checkout platform available and building from scratch will be costly, impact - high, ease of use - has learning curve and also tech glitches that can slow down checkout]
   2. Use google algos to find the waiting time for each checkout and display it upfront in an app so that users can decide which counter to select. [cost - low, impact - low. also might not meet the key objective of increasing usage on google platform]
   3. Integrate avg. checkout time for the store in google maps so that along with time to reach, it also shows what is avg. checkout time at that point of time so that customers can plan better. [cost - low since they can use existing platform, impact - high, ease of use- high]
7. Prioritization of solutions based on cost to build, impact to customer and ease of use will select solution c.
8. Metrics
   1. number of users who see the checkout time per month
      1. Proxy of see the checkout can be checked the default time to see different checkout time at different times of the day.
   2. month on month retention numbers
   3. avg. time spent on the google maps platform for users who saw the information v/s who didn't saw.
9. Trade off
   1. The risk of adoption is how these stores are interested in providing this information to maps - we need to convince them that this will help streamline experience for their users and they can also use the opportunity to increase foot fall in offtimes since now users will see which are off times.

Clarify

• Improving in person grocery or online? [assuming online - surge in online shopping]
• Does google have an existing product that we want to improve or is this a new product? [Assume new product]
• Assume focus on US? [yes]
• Any insights about this need or contraints to consider? [no]

• As google, we are leaders in search and make money based adversising. Product search is important that goal. More generally, we want to not only organize info, but help people get things done.
• We could think about aquisition, activation, retention, or monetization. In this case, I'd like to focus on building a feature that will get users into the google ecosystem thus it should be product that people use over and over again, so engagement and retention will key indicators of success.

• Never used online groceries - may not feel comfortable with tech or putting payment details online
• Reluct users of online groceries - have used it due to the panedemic but plan to return to in person once safe
• Die hard online grocery buyers - rarely if ever shop in person and always prefer online

• Decide its time to order groceries
• Decide which store to purchase from
• Look at the options available
  • PP: take time to review options, no way to easily have a routine order
    • High
  • PP: miss getting inspired about seasonal or new products and you tend to shop based on a list
    • High
• Put items in cart, checkout
• Shopper selects what is available and may substitute or not buy items if out of stock.
  • PP: if you are not actively monitoring your app while they are shopping, can miss providing guidance on subsitutions or don't know what is out of stock
    • High
• Get delivery in a matter of hours or days, depending on availabiilty of shopper
  • PP: Delivery windows can broad, and you may not know the window until you are done putting items in cart
    • High

• Recommendations for shopping - by season, by holiday, by new products, based on what you have previously ordered (netflix)
• Lock in delivery window before putting items in cart
• Real time tracking of delivery person (like uber)
• Weekly shopping list for items ordered on a routine basis - default basic shoppling
• Training of shoppers in optimal produce selection and in bagging - prevent fruit getting bruised, enables picking ripe avacdoes

• shopping recommendations
  • Impact - High
  • Effort - High
  • Prioritization - Must have
• Lock in delivery window for 60 min while shopping
  • Impact -high
  • Effort - Med
  • Priorization - Must have
• Real time tracking of delivery person
  • Impact - Med
  • Effort - Med 
  • Priorization - Nice to have
• weekly shopping list
  • Impact - High
  • Effort - Med
  • Priorization - Must have
• Training of shoppers
  • Impact - Med
  • Effort - Low - develop online videos for training
  • Priorization - Nice to have

• Primary  - routine usage - WAU or MAU
• Secondary - engagement with new features - # of recommended items added to cart, changes in WAU or MAU due to addition of delivery lock in, time savings of users after additon of weekly shopping list, # of items on list that are actually checked out

• Focused on relucant users, identified user journey, key pain points, and identified 5 potential solutions. Narrowed down to 3 and identified metrics for success.

I've been wanting to answer this product improvement question. Here's my thoughts:

1. Clarification
   1. Are we talking "in store - shopping experience" or "online - shopping experience" ? - You choose
   2. Are we talking US grocery stores or Globally ? - You choose
   3. Are we Google or are we the store ? - You choose
   4. Are we looking at any specific category of items - you choose
2. I am going to assume we are a store chain looking at US grocery stores and the goal is to improve the in-store shopping experience
3. Goals - 
   1. Is there a specific Goal you want me to focus on - you decide
   2. I am going to choose Engagement as a Goal to concentrate on, here are few of the reasons why
      1. I am going to assume the stores are well known, and its not an issue with Acquiring users
      2. Since we are talking about In-store shopping experience, the users are already in the stores i.e. Activated
      3. Retention - this could be a secondary goal, since if the engagement increases we can start looking at Retention
      4. Revenue - Again this will be an after-effect from a good shopping experience
4. Lets look at few potential personas of In-store grocery shoppers
   1. Family shoppers - usually a couple with a kid, when they come to shop as a family, they intend to shop for an extended period of time, and their carts are pretty big
   2. Family shoppers - individuals - This will be for the family, but these are rushed out trips, like a one off purchase. They could also be shopping for a wide variety of items as well.
   3. Small business owners - They would be looking for the cheapest price and would intend to look at volume purchases
   4. Errand boys - usually a teen / help someone wanting to make quick trips to the grocery store
   5. The specialist - This would be someone who intends to purchase quality materials, the freshest fish, the best bakery
5. I would like to focus on the "Errand Boys", since this persona is associated with many frequent purchases, as opposed to one bulk purchase. This will be an opportunity for us to quickly measure engagement as opposed to some of the others
6. Lets look at the journey map of this user
   1. User is on the go, traveling somewhere either to work or to school, when they suddenly remember, I am out of milk. Or someone from home, calls and tells while coming back get milk
   2. User makes a detour on the way to the store
   3. User parks the car
   4. User rushes to the store.
   5. User grabs a basket / cart
   6. User enters the store, goes to the milk aisle.
   7. User opens the Milk refrigerator, picks up Milk
   8. User puts the Milk bottle on his bag, cart
   9. User remembers that they are out of eggs too
   10. User goes back to the egg aisle, picks up egg, and puts in the cart
   11. User goes to the checkout aisle
   12. User user takes out milk / eggs from cart, puts them on the belt
   13. User puts in his loyalty no, pays for the items
   14. User picks up milk / eggs
   15. User returns the cart / basket
   16. User goes to his car, puts his items in the trunk
   17. User starts his car and goes away
7. Lets look at some of the pain points that can occur at each step

   1. Journey step	Pain points	Impact to user
      User is on the go, traveling somewhere either to work or to school, when they suddenly remember, I am out of milk. Or someone from home, calls and tells while coming back get milk	dont have a place to write down dont know what else might be missing in the house	s
      User makes a detour on the way to the store	have to find the nearest store	s
      User parks the car	dont know how far the parking is from the shop entrance what if no parking spots are available	s
      User rushes to the store
      User grabs a basket / cart	the cart is going to slow me down, the basket may not be enough	s
      User enters the store, goes to the milk aisle	new location, unfamiliar layout, milk aisle is to the back of the store	m
      User opens the Milk refrigerator, picks up Milk	milk is out of stock	s
      User puts the Milk bottle on his bag, cart	cart is too big, basket is too small, the basket will be heavy	s
      User remembers that they are out of eggs too	basket may not have space for eggs	m
      User goes back to the egg aisle, picks up egg, and puts in the cart	have to find where the eggs are, doesnt have my favorite eggs	s
      User goes to the checkout aisle	pretty long queue, holding the heavy basket is tiring	m
      User user takes out milk / eggs from cart, puts them on the belt	what if the eggs break, the cashier is going to put them in plastic bags, i dont like using plastic bags	s
      User puts in his loyalty no, pays for the items
      User picks up milk / eggs
      User returns the cart / basket	have to go to the cart return place, have to carry the milk / eggs from there to the car	s
      User goes to his car, puts his items in the trunk	dont have enough hands	s
      User starts his car and goes away

       

   2. I would like to concentrate on the pain points

      1. Unfamiliar layout, dont know where the milk aisle is, especially since 

         1. there are a wide variety of tools available today that can help with pre-ordering, curbside pickup. 

         2. There is a reason the user has to visit the store and not take advantage of the features available because

            1. He is pressed for time

            2. He doesnt have the time to go through the whole process of choosing / picking up items on the store app

            3. He is at a point where going to the store and picking up is more convenient than ordering it on the app

   3. A few features come to mind to hasten the whole experience

      1. In store map

         1. user can be shown on the app, the nearest / shortest path to the milk aisle

      2. In store navigation

         1. voice guides can help the user interact and provide cues, i.e. you are on aisle 3, the milk aisle is on aisle 21, go forward and turn right, the milk aisle is on the 2nd door

      3. real time express - pickup

         1. some form of junction stops near high traffic areas which are staffed by "runners" and / or conveyor belts. the user can say I need Horizon 2% 1 gallon milk to an IVR and based on his ID, a staff member slaps an order number and the customer ID on the milk 

      4. Drive thru pickup

         1. The user drives thru dedicated lane, and there will be presorted stations with key items, the user can choose from a display board and move forward to pickup his order

   4. Lets look at prioritizing these 

      1. Feature	Impact to user	complexity	potential metrics
         In store Map	L	L	average number of items looked up ; average number of items looked up / successful purchase ; elapsed time between item lookup and checkout
         In store voice guided navigation	M	L	average number of items suggested ; % route deviation ; % route speed variance between estimated and actual; Variance between items suggested on route vs actual items on checkout
         real time express-pickup	H	H	items per station; items per station choosen as a % of overall order ; speed of inventory movement per item ; idle time for a station
         drive thru pickup	H	H	items per station; number of orders at a station; avg shopping time; avg number of cars at a station;

          

      2. I would like to choose In-Store voice guided activation. The reasons are

         1. an In-store map while convenient is already offered by many stores, however since the focus is on a user speed of checkout, ideally he would prefer looking away from the smartphone

         2. The real time - express pickup as well as the drive thru pickup, require major changes to the store layout. This can be an option if metrics suggests that the number of "errand boy" orders is pretty significant 

   5. Summary - I would like to build a feature focusing on an Errand boy persona, which is characterized by a very rush through shopping experience usually 1-4 items, I would focus on having the user be guided through voice guided navigation so that they can find items faster