This post is another installment of our Trust Evaluation series where we walk through the customer journey on different ecommerce sites and point out the trust signals we find along the way. Our goal is to help ecommerce managers learn how to look at their own sites from the perspective of a new customer and find areas of friction that could be improved with the help of trust signals.

In this Trust Evaluation, I’ll be taking a look at joybird.com.

I recently moved, so I have been spending A LOT of time shopping for furniture and decor to put in my new apartment. I’m a girl on a budget, so I’ve loved using Google Shopping to compare prices of similar products from different merchants. One of the merchants that appeared several times in my search results was Joybird, and since I hadn’t shopped on the site before, I thought it would be a perfect candidate for my next website trust evaluation.

Continue reading or watch the video to see what I learned in my Trust Evaluation for joybird.com.

Trust Evaluation for joybird.com

Off-page elements

Some important trust indicators don’t fall within one specific page but span across the site as a whole. For example, the site domain used the business name and a .com suffix, which is one that most consumers trust, so the site earned one point for that. I also looked in the browser bar to see that the site has an SSL or TLS certificate, which tells me that the site transmits data safely with encryption.

Floating elements

Sites can build trust across the customer journey by including floating elements like trust badges and chat widgets. I didn’t see any floating elements on this site, so they didn’t earn any points in this category.

Site header

New visitors rely on a site header to figure out how to navigate and find important business information. Joybird’s header included important links to their about us page and account login page, but I would have liked to see more contact information displayed like their phone number or email address.

Another element I looked at was the site logo, which featured a rainbow in honor of Pride month. I loved their support for the LGBTQ+ community, however, I would suggest that they increase the size of the logo slightly, since the company name appeared small and could be hard to read for some people.

Site footer

Joybird earned tons of points for having lots of trust signals in the site footer. Things like a privacy policy, terms and conditions, social media links, and contact links all help to show concerned visitors that this website is run by a legitimate business.

Homepage

Joybird has a beautiful homepage filled with plenty of trust signals. They earned 4 points by having logical product categories, testimonials from previous customers, a guarantee trust indicator, and a 90 day returns policy trust indicator.

Category page

I’m in the market for a new rug, so I decided to check out the decor category page. The products had nice photos and clear prices with a breakdown of the cost if a customer wishes to pay in monthly installments. I would have liked to see more information about returns and shipping on this page.

Product page

The product page I looked at included most of the information you would hope to find. I especially liked that the page included an estimated delivery time as well as photos provided by customers who reviewed the product.

About page

Joybird has several different pages with information about the company. A lot of the information was presented in video format, which many customers do appreciate, but I wish there was a bit more in written form for those that prefer to read. I also wish some of the information was condensed into fewer pages, but overall I appreciated getting to learn more about how their products are made and how they give back to the community.

Contact us page

The contact us page wasn’t particularly easy to find, it’s linked in the site footer under “email”, but it contains some helpful information like their phone number, hours of operation, and a contact form.

Login and register pages

The site doesn’t have a dedicated login and register page, but instead has a relatively simple sidebar pop up. They earned points by having a third-party sign in via Facebook and displaying the terms and conditions, however I think they also need to add a forgot password link for returning customers, as well as a list of account benefits for new customers.

Shopping cart page

The site also went with a sidebar popup instead of having a dedicated shopping cart page. Joybird earned points by building trust with the order summary, a security and payment related trust indicator, and a promo code field. The main thing I would like to see be added here is an estimated delivery time frame. It was included on the product page, but bringing it over to the cart would help to remind customers how soon they will receive their order if they did more shopping before immediately proceeding to the cart.

Checkout page

The checkout did a nice job of presenting the full breakdown of the order costs and reassuring shoppers that they can return their purchase within 90 days if they aren’t happy with it. They did include a security trust indicator near the payment information field by displaying a padlock icon with the phrase “Secure and encrypted.” However, because this is a trust indicator that was created in house, there’s no way for a customer to verify this claim. If they used a trust badge like TrustedSite’s Secure Checkout trustmark, it would allow customers to see that a third-party has verified that the checkout is secure and holds the site accountable to this claim.

Bonus points

Joybird earned 4 bonus points for having an FAQs section, recent and quality content on their blog, and a sizable follower count on social media.

Final score

Joybird earned a total of 68 points, which puts them well within our Likely Safe category. Sites in this category display a strong indication of trust, but we always recommend that customers do their own research before making a purchase so that they can be sure the site is secure and their order will be fulfilled as expected.

To grow trust even further, I’d recommend that Joybird add a few things like contact information in their header and footer, including a live chat on more pages, and adding third-party trust badges to show that an outside organization endorses their business.

Overall, the site appears very trustworthy, and I look forward to shopping at Joybird more in the future!

Hopefully this evaluation helped you get a better idea of the trust signals that online shoppers look for as they progress through the customer journey. If you need any advice on adding trust signals, or would like us to evaluate your site, get in touch!