UI Optimization: 1cloud Experience

Designing and creating product interfaces is one of the areas in which many projects sometimes have to compromise. Today we will talk about how we in 1cloud upgraded the project website and developed some user-defined functions.

Website user interface design is a very painstaking task. It's no secret that the simpler and clearer the UI, the greater the likelihood that a person who visits the site will become a client. On Habr once material was published in which ten tips on creating a website for a hosting provider were described. We managed to realize some of them. In the course of work, some ideas had to be abandoned, but no less interesting solutions came to replace them.

As follows, we started by changing the appearance of the front page. When a user gets to the site, he should immediately get what interests him. A potential client wants to immediately know the cost of service and pricing, that is, get the most complete information about tariffs. Users do not want to go from one page to another for a long time in search of the desired tab.

For this reason, the price calculator was made by us on the main page of the site. With it, customers can choose for themselves one of the pre-prepared tariffs or configure it themselves. The calculator looks like this:



Such a number of tariffs (3 standard and 1 customizable) was chosen by chance. Users often react negatively to too many tariff plans if they differ in only minor details.

We left the right for the client to tighten the smallest screws of the system on their own. After that, it was decided to work on another problem that a large number of companies are facing.



According to a study , 86% of users do not want to bother creating an account on the site. A person wants to solve his problem as quickly as possible, therefore with a high degree of probability he will not fill out countless registration forms and understand what is written on the captcha - he will prefer to leave the resource.



Therefore, we implemented a scheme where, for registration on the site, you only need to enter the email address, and to order a virtual server, specify the desired operating system.

However, the first thing that the consumer of IT services thinks about is whether he will be able to keep his data safe? Some hosting providers do not use https, which can scare potential customers. Sites 1cloud.ru and panel.1cloud.ru use SSL certificates issued by the Certification Center Go Daddy.

I think you’ll agree that account security is an integral part of the online service, but there are times when “security” becomes too intrusive. At such moments, using the service becomes extremely inconvenient. For example, many do not wantEnter your phone number to complete the purchase. Therefore, we decided to test the possibility of placing an order without SMS verification.

The simplicity of registration does not guarantee that the client will begin to use the services of the company - it can be pushed away by the inability to pay for the service using one of the usual payment services. Therefore, for individuals we added the ability to pay using Visa and Master Card, as well as electronic services and mobile accounts: QIWI, Webmoney, YandexMoney, MTS, Megafon, Money.mail.ru, Svyaznoy, Euroset and others. Legal entities can only pay for services using an account, but it can be generated directly in your account.

Even after the release of the new site, we continue to test and collect data, and also monitor the indicators (whether the time spent by the client on the site has increased, whether the failure rates have decreased, etc.). All the solutions described are used to entice the customer into the conversion funnel, but after that he still needs to be kept. In this regard, we are constantly introducing new features and improving our product. For example, we added the ability to track server load.

Now 1cloud hosting clients can see the status of their servers in real time. Having the ability to quickly assess the current load, the user is able to very flexibly manage the infrastructure. In moments of "bursts of activity", the owner of the server simply adds a new virtual machine, and turns it off when a "recession" occurs.

In order to organize the output of server information to the control panel, we needed to decide on a graphic library. We considered the following options: Mbostock D3, Flotcharts, jqPlot, JS Charts, Canvas 3D Graph, Plotkit, Raphaël, AM Charts and HighCharts (you can find even more graphic libraries here ).

As a result, we opted for the latter option. HighCharts bribed with good documentation, the overall quality of the work on the test results and a responsive support team that helped us several times seriously. Now we can get information about the load of each virtual machine. The user can see data on CPU loading, memory loading, load on the communication channel and the average amount of information read and written per unit of time.



Availability of easily accessible load information gives customers the opportunity to understand why they are paying money. If the paid infrastructure is clearly redundant for the load of a particular project, you can simply refuse unnecessary services, seriously saving.

In the current economic situation, company leaders are forced to think about cost optimization, which does not affect the product development in the most positive way. However, you need to save so that customers do not notice a decrease in the quality of services provided. In a situation where a company is forced to maintain its own infrastructure, this is difficult to do. Hosting simplifies this task.

Many Russian and foreign hosting providers have special referral programs. Companies participating in them can receive deductions and discounts for attracting new customers by generating a referral link in your account and transferring it to other Internet users. We also have a referral program in 1cloud.