Fighting information asymmetry in 1000 x 600 pixels

Few people love and even understand the real estate sector — but they are forced to interact with. How might we improve the UX?

Photo credits: Daniel Schludi on Unsplash

Summary

1. First things first: what’s Casavo?
2. Context

• Simplified pre-offer user journey
• The bigger picture

3. Attack plan and RACI matrix

4. Revamping the last step pre-offer “Find out more” pages

• Last step pre-offer
• Preparation phase: Miro, benchmark and Html.to.design
• Final UI

5. Final thoughts

1. First things first: what’s Casavo?

Casavo is the next-generation European platform that matches home sellers’ needs with homebuyers’ desires through an integrated and personalized experience.

We aim to change how people sell, live, and buy homes in Europe. To achieve this ambitious goal, we are redesigning the home selling and buying experience, piece after piece.

2. Context

This whole project started with a Jira task with a cryptic name: “[Post-mandate experience] Better communicate distinctive value prop”. Casavo offers 2 selling solutions: “Sell to Casavo”, and “Find a buyer with Casavo”.

Few people love the real estate sector, and even fewer have all the tools to understand its mechanisms. As a result, sellers often feel like spectators in one of the most critical and demanding transactions of their lives.

Moreover, the real estate sector has a really bad reputation — research showed that often both sellers and buyers feel like brokers are doing their interests, rather than their clients' ones.

How might we improve the user experience and enhance value proposition clarity?

2.1 Simplified pre-offer user journey

Here are the 5 steps of seller experience before receiving a selling solution from a Casavo seller advisor:

1. Seller completes a valuation flow of their house
2. Casavo algorithm gives a first valuation range
3. Seller downloads the Casavo app to have a more precise valuation
4. Seller sends all information needed
5. Seller lead presents 1 or 2 selling solutions, depending on multiple criteria (location, size, renovation status,…)

2.2 The bigger picture

When tackling this kind of project, copy improvements cannot be enough. I had to rethink the whole experience, gather all information about both selling solutions, and federate internal teams to work on it.

As of today, information about selling solutions is spread in 5 different touchpoints:

• https://casavo.com/
• https://casavo.com/sell-house/
• https://casavo.com/seller-advantages/
• FAQ
• detail pages, once sellers have filled all information in the app

Only the last touchpoint falls directly into my domain, as the copywriter and her marketing team are in charge of all casavo.com pages and the FAQ. So I built an attack plan and a RACI matrix to make it all work, and to try to federate the whole team on a topic with low priority and no KPI attached.

3. Attack plan and RACI matrix

I have identified 4 different actions that can improve the general understanding of both selling solutions:

• Creating a FAQ section fully dedicated to “Find a buyer with Casavo” selling solution
• Inverting “Sell to Casavo” and “Find a buyer with Casavo” selling solutions in the valuation range screen and at https://casavo.com/sell-house/ (in 2023, Casavo wants to push more on the “Find a buyer with Casavo”, rather than “Sell to Casavo”)
• Revamping the last step pre-offer “Find out more” pages

One proposal of mine does not appear here as it was rejected by the team, especially by product designers. I suggested making “Sell to Casavo” and “Find a buyer with Casavo” selling solutions cards clickable in the valuation range screen”.

Here’s why:

• it would force users to leave the flow
• it would decrease the conversion rate of the “Complete your house profile”
• it would go against the progressive disclosure principle, by sharing too much information when they’re not needed

Still, we’ll work on them to improve the UI — User research heatmaps show many users click on them, but they’re not clickable.

4. Revamping the last step pre-offer “Find out more” pages

Let’s now focus on the only task I could put my hands on.

4.1 Last step pre-offer

Once the seller sends all information needed, they have to wait approximately 48 hours to be called back by the seller lead.

During the phone call, the seller lead presents the “Find a buyer with Casavo” selling solution. If the seller's house is eligible, the seller lead also explains the “Sell to Casavo” one.

Why are these screens problematic on the seller’s side?

• Mental load: the seller has to do everything by phone and might forget something. Moreover, only 1 person can be in charge, even if 2 people are selling their house
• Accessibility: most information is shared orally, and there’s no written equivalent sent upfront
• Information asymmetry: the seller has to rely 100% on what the seller lead tells them: their relationship is asymmetrical
• Partial information: the information is partial, sellers have to go back and forth to try to compare information, and bullet points are not talking about the same things, so comparing selling solutions is impossible

Why are these screens problematic on the Casavo Seller lead side?

• Mental load: Seller leads waste a lot of time repeating information and has to be 100% sure they said it all
• Accessibility: information is shared orally, and there’s no written equivalent sent upfront
• Information asymmetry: Seller leads have on their shoulder the responsibility to fight information asymmetry

Solutions should:

• give users all information
• make information easily comparable
• allow users to have information under their eyes at a glance

4.2 Preparation phase

Miro

First, I had to make sure I knew all about both selling solutions.

I studied the 5 touchpoints (https://casavo.com/, https://casavo.com/sell-house/, https://casavo.com/seller-advantages/, FAQ, detail pages) and tried to organize all information by topic (ex. timeline, buyers, additional services).

⭐️Bonus point ⭐️

While reading across touchpoints, I found some inconsistencies regarding the “Sell to Casavo” solutions.

In the product and in the FAQ we say we’ll come back to the seller in 48 hours, but on the landing page, we say we’ll do so in 24 hours.

The correct info was 48 hours. I informed the copywriter and made the change on the spot. That’s teamwork!

Benchmark

As all designers say at least 10 times a day — “You don’t have to reinvent the wheel.”

I had to take inspiration from existing patterns. In so doing, I save time both for myself and for users, as they do not have to learn something completely new.

I instinctively turned to pages that allow users to compare services. I focused on pricing plan screens (Spotify, Notion, Mailchimp, Shopify, Revolut), but I also used a few sites to compare smartphones (GSMarena).

I focused on mobile-first, as sellers manage everything from the app. That’s why the title is “Fighting information asymmetry in 1000 x 600 pixels”.

I used the plugin html.to.design on Figma to prepare for the next phase.

Html.to.design

Using the Html.to.design plugin, I applied Casavo selling solutions to the Shopify pricing plan, and I applied to it Casavo content. It was ugly, but it kind of worked — and, most important of all, let me picture what I had in mind.

Initially, I tried to condense it all into 1 screen only, but it didn’t work.

Then, I presented both solutions (both Shopify’s one at the left, and 1 screen only at the right) to the product designer in charge, to let him see how I pictured it all. Time to make it design system approved!

4.3 Final UI

The product designer and I presented this UI during a UX review to gather feedback.

All product designers and the head of the tribe Seller agreed on this solution.

This solution:

• ✅ gives users all information
• ✅ makes information easily comparable

But:

• ❌ it doesn’t allow users to have information under their eyes at a glance.

5. Final thoughts

I finished this project coinciding with the end of my probationary period. And this project gave me a great reason to stay. Here are this project’s pros and cons.

Pros

• I was able to hold a fruitful collaboration with different domains, from marketing to sales, thanks to project management skills
• It was one content-first design task. I prepared the floor for the product designer to work on the UI, but it all started with the content several weeks beforehand
• I used for the first time a RACI matrix to have a clearer idea of ownership

Cons

• I learned that most of Casavo's documentation is spread all over and mainly shared orally by different stakeholders.
• I definitely need to improve my UI skills, and I already organized some shadowing sessions with the product designers. Despite it not being my specialty, it’s important Product designers and I speak the same language and understand each other’s needs

Thanks to the whole tribe and to all the stakeholders who helped me break this project down. ❤️

Have some feedback on this article? Great!

Let me know in the comments, or send me a message on LinkedIn ✨

I didn’t find a brand picture that I could use as a cover — so here is one that I liked instead. I hope the brand team won’t send me angry Slack messages ❤️