Stop copying travel websites: how a common UI is hiding your best events
When customers come to your events page, what they want is simple: to find the right event, at the right time, quickly and easily.
And yet, for many Users on event sites, this is becoming a typical view when searching for shows by date and time.
At first glance, it seems like a good idea. It’s familiar, borrowed from the travel industry. While they work well for travel, allowing users to quickly choose dates for their holiday, it doesn’t fit user behaviours when searching for an event.
We put this thinking to the test with Warwick Arts Centre:
Version 1.0 — The Calendar-Heavy Approach
Users kept getting stuck. Filtering was confusing.
Conversion rate: 6.78%
Version 2.0 — Cleaner, But Still Calendar-Led
This version looked nicer, but people still couldn’t easily find the alternative views.
Conversion rate: 5.9%
A small UX change + behaviour-led thinking = more tickets sold and fewer frustrated users.
We discussed all of the details of this project during our session at the AMA Conference - read all about it here.
Final thoughts
Calendar UI certainly has it’s place - in the travel industry - but not at such a key conversion point for your customers. When you design around real user behaviour, your programme becomes easier to explore, more enjoyable to browse, and far more effective at converting casual visitors into ticket-buyers.
If you’d like help rethinking your What's On page (or want us to review your current design), we’d love to chat - get in touch here.
That doesn’t mean calendars and events never mix
Despite the reasons covered above, our work with the cutting-edge Arts and Culture Venue BEAM Hertford caused us to rethink the calendar UI. Click here to read the case study and discover how we made a calendar UI that works.