Intro
Cleartrip for Work is Cleartrip’s latest SME offering. Through Cleartrip for Work, travellers with a GST number can access unlimited work fares on flights with benefits that include unlimited cash-back, complimentary in-flight meals, zero trip modification charges, reduced cancellation fee, and reduced seat selection fee through a simple sign-in process. Travellers can avail benefits across flights and hotels for domestic and international travel.
Storyline
Arun works for a design startup as an accountant. He is responsible for booking flights and hotels for all the teammate’s official travel needs. As the startup is not affiliated to any corporate travel programme, he gets no benefits on the bookings. By signing up for Cleartrip for Work, Arun avails complimentary in-flight meals, zero trip modification charges, reduced cancellation fee, and reduced seat selection fee for all flight bookings and also gets cash-back that gets credited to his Cleartrip Wallet, which he can use for his personal use.
Task
Design the Experience of Cleartrip for Work across Desktop, Android, iOS (UI, UX, branding, visual style, Illustrations, etc).
Team
I led the design for the project, worked closely with Devanshu, Vishnu (Product designers), Anurhea, Prasanna (Product Managers), Sahil (Design Head) and the iOS, Android developers at Cleartrip.
Timeline
The project roughly took two months for the desktop flows, and one month for the mobile platforms. The feature was launched in about 6 six months.
Research, Ideation and Design
Airline fares
The price difference between Corporate and Retail fares usually ranges from 0 to 50%. With free seat selection, meal and zero cancellation, the corporate fares make a lot of sense when it comes to business travel. What we observed is that the larger a company is, the more they book corporate fares.
Large enterprises book all their tickets on corporate fares, while the smallest of corporates book only the cheapest fares (usually retail fares). Airlines, identifying the gap between the corporate and retail fares, introduced a product in between them called “SME Fares” that offers free meal, paid seats and zero change fee (but a small cancellation charge).
1. Corporate Fare
Fares for Corporate travellers with benefits like Seat selection, meals, cancellation, amendments, free credit balance. This was accessible only to organisations affiliated with corporate travel programmes.
2. Retail Fares
Fares for retail users accompanied with no additional benefits.
3. SME Fares
Fares for SME’s. SME fares are basically modified corporate fares (offer free meals, paid seats and zero change fee).
Cleartrip and SME bookings
Cleartrip worked with all major airlines and hotels to unlock the SME benefits that were previously accessible only to organisations affiliated with corporate travel programmes, directly to the traveller.
Cleartrip having close to two hundred bookings with GSTIN per day. This was a large opportunity, to tap into the SME space.
SME fares were to be exposed to retail customers (with a GSTIN) of Cleartrip. (The mandate for availing the fare from Cleartrip is a GSTIN and successful approval of the GST documents).
User research
We (Product and design) spoke to the Cleartrip's GSTIN users to understand the SME’s and also their travel needs. The key findings were:
- A single person booked for the whole team
- Many booked with CEO’s credit card
- Wanted some cashback that they could use personally
- GST compliant invoices
- Travel reports
- Does not want to be associated with a corporate travel programme
- Use the commonly used platform to book for business travel instead of a Corporate product
Target Users
- SME employees
- Freelancers & Consultants
- Business owners & Entrepreneurs
- GSTIN holders
Value proposition
- Unlimited Work fares on flights
- Complimentary in-flight meals
- Zero trip modification charges
- Reduced cancellation fee
- Reduced seat selection fee
- Cash-back across flights and hotels for domestic and international travel.
Use cases
- Access the SME fares for the benefit it offers
- Access to the GST invoices for reimbursements
- Access to the travel reports
- Add multiple GSTIN (for consultants/ freelancers)
- Book for business travel but through the retail website
- Compare the benefits of Normal fare and SME fare to arrive at a decision
- Accumulate cash back and use it for other bookings
Types of users at Cleartrip
Cleartrip lets users book flights and hotels without creating an account, We had majorly 3 types of users that could be potentially targeted for Cleartrip for Work.
1. New user- User who is new to Cleartrip platform. This user needs to create an account to access Cleartrip for Work.
2. Unconfirmed user- User who has previously booked with a GSTIN using Cleartrip, but has not set up the password/ completed account creation process. This user needs to set a password and complete the account creation process to access Cleartrip for Work.
3. Signed in user- This user has an active account and also has previously booked with a GSTIN on Cleartrip.
User flows
A. Onboarding
- Landing page
- Home Screen nudge to onboarding (Desktop + Mobile)
- Search results page nudge to onboarding (Desktop + Mobile)
- Confirmation screen nudge to onboarding (Desktop + Mobile)
- Profile, GSTIN page nudge to onboarding (Desktop + Mobile)
B. Book flow
- Search results page with Work fares (Desktop + Mobile)
- Itinerary with Work fare along with Retail fare (Desktop + Mobile)
- Itinerary with GSTIN input (Desktop + Mobile)
- A confirmation page with cash-back communication (Desktop + Mobile)
C. Profile
- Download travel reports (Desktop + Mobile)
- Add multiple GSTIN's (Desktop + Mobile)
Onboarding through landing page (Desktop + Mobile)
Given the fact that we would need a different set of information from the 3 types for onboarding them.
We designed a landing page in a way that explains the features of the programme and also lets the 3 types of users onboard at ease.
Cache was used to identify the type of user and collect the relevant information from the user and onboard him in least the number of steps.
The landing page has a mobile optimised version that will be used in mobile platforms, functioning the same way.
1. New user landing on the website has to fill in all the details, complete th account creation to access Cleartrip for Work.
2. Unconfirmed user has to set a password and complete the account creation to access Cleartrip for Work (Other input fields gets pre-filled).
3. Signed in user has to just give his consent to access Cleartrip for Work.
Post successful signup, a user can enjoy the benefits of Cleartrip for Work on Cleartrip.com
PS. A Cleartrip for Work user has to upload the GST documents to complete the Cleartrip for Work profile. The user is allowed to book 8 flight/ hotel bookings during the document approval period (Trial). Post the period, Work fares will get disabled.
Back story
We also tried to onboard the users on Cleartrip, reusing the existing signup flow of Cleartrip, instead of taking the user a different landing page.
As users might want to know more details of the product, the features, the charges involved etc.
The idea was dropped, and we decided to create the landing page as the source for all types of account creation.
Product Flows (Mobile)
A. Onboarding
1. New user
Through any fresh download of the app, a user can book flights, hotels experiences without creating an account.
For converting these users to Cleartrip for Work, We created nudges of Cleartrip for Work on the Search results and Booking confirmation screen. These nudges would lead to the mobile optimised landing page and then to successful account creation.
These users will have to fill the complete form (mandate information) to sign up to Cleartrip for Work.
As this user is new to Cleartrip, we did not want to burden the user with nudges for new features. So we decided to have a limited number of effective nudges.
At Cleartrip, the nudges in the Search results have always performed well in the past. The adoption of new features from the search result screen was always high.
The booking confirmation screen is one of the places that the users have time to consume new information. hence a nudge was added here.
2. Unconfirmed user
A user who has already booked on Cleartrip with his GSTIN, For converting these users to Cleartrip for Work, We created nudges of Cleartrip for Work on the Home screen, Search results, Profile, Booking confirmation screen.
These nudges would lead to the mobile optimised landing page and then to successful account creation. These users will have to only set a password to activate Cleartrip for Work.
As mentioned earlier, the nudges in the Search results have always performed well in the past. The adoption of new features from the search result screen was always high.
The booking confirmation screen is one of the places that the users have time to consume new information. hence a nudge here could lead to conversion.
For people who are exploring the app, We tried nudges at the Home and Profile screens of the app.
3. Signed in user
A user who already has an active Cleartrip account, booked with his GSTIN, For converting these users to Cleartrip for Work, We created nudges of Cleartrip for Work on the Home screen, Search results, Profile, Booking confirmation screen.
These nudges would lead to the mobile optimised landing page and then to successful account creation. These users will just have to give consent to upgrade to Cleartrip for Work.
The onboarding page was modified for these sets of users. We reduced the number of taps here and clubbed the onboarding form with the intro screen.
As mentioned earlier, the nudges in the Search results have always performed well in the past. The adoption of new features from the search result screen was always high.
The booking confirmation screen is one of the places that the users have time to consume new information. hence a nudge here could lead to conversion.
For people who are exploring the app, We tried nudges at the Home and Profile sections of the app.
Back story
An itinerary/search result nudge exposing the work fare was an excellent conversion point. But as there were legal restrictions on exposing the work fares without a registered GSTIN, an account with Cleartrip. Also, the time taken for onboarding the user to Cleartrip for Work, (even though was very minimal), could lead to fare expiry. Thus could lead to a bad experience. Hence we dropped the plan to onboard the users from itinerary and search results by exposing the work fare.
B. Book Flow
Once a user gets onboarded to Cleartrip for Work, the benefits are activated.
A first run was designed to explain the user about the Work fare and its placement in the screen.
The itinerary screen had the two fares, Retail fare and Work fare. The cards mentioned the benefits offered by both. The cheapest one was always pre-selected.
In the traveller details screen, the GSTIN of the user gets pre pre-populated, the user can choose to add a new GSTIN or Select one from his saved set.
The booking confirmation had the reassurance of the cash-back and the other benefits the user has received.
C. Profile & Accounts
From the Cleartrip for Work profile, A verified member can add multiple GSTIN’s and use them at ease while booking. Members can also download travel reports that can be used for claiming reimbursements.
We also had introduced a trial period, in which, all members can avail benefits without document verification. Post the trial period, a member will have to verify the GST documents to avail the benefits. We had used emailers, in app notifications to let members know about the trial period status. Members could submit the documents via desktop and mobile.
Challenges
An itinerary/search result nudge exposing the work fare was an excellent conversion point. But as there were legal restrictions on exposing the work fares without a registered GSTIN, an account with Cleartrip. Also the time taken for onboarding the user to Cleartrip for Work, even though was very minimal, could lead to fare expiry. Thus could lead to a bad experience. Hence we did dropped the plan to onboard the users from itinerary and search results by exposing the work fare.
Impact
The landing page and Desktop version of the product went out live first. The nudges in the Search results page, Booking confirmation page were responsible for the majority of the conversions. We had observed close to 3000 sign-ups to Cleartrip for work in the first week of launch. The number of booking through Work fares doubled in a month. After two weeks of desktop launch, the mobile platforms went out live (adding to Work fare bookings).
Press release: https://www.cleartrip.com/press/releases/2019/cleartrip-launches-a-transformative-solution-cleartrip-for-work/
What could have been better?
As the intention of booking is clear for a user coming to Cleartrip (personal/business travel). I am envisioning a product that can have two funnels for the user to choose from. A user entering the personal funnel gets access to the offerings of Cleartrip that can be used for personal travel, and the user entering the business funnel, gets access to the offerings of Cleartrip that can be used for business travel.
Launch T Shirt - Clear for Takeoff. (The last guy standing (right) was absent for the photoshoot, I managed photoshopping him though :P)
Thank you!
