Rebuilding the tentree category page people were leaving
A Shopify template rebuild for a sustainable apparel brand, followed by a second project on the blog template that turned it into an acquisition surface.
Month over month conversion lift on product category pages
Month over month blog traffic lift after the template rebuild
Templates rebuilt, shipped sequentially rather than as one redesign
| My role | Independent eCommerce UX consultant. Diagnosis, design, and Shopify template work. |
|---|---|
| Client | tentree, a direct to consumer sustainable apparel brand. |
| Funnel stage | Acquisition on the blog, consideration on category pages. |
| Platform | Shopify, responsive web, mobile first. |
| Timeline | 2018 to 2019. |
The problem
Traffic was arriving and not converting. Category pages were doing the job of a catalog rather than the job of a salesperson: shoppers could see that products existed, but the page gave them little reason to pick one and open it.
To add: the specific numbers you started from, such as the baseline conversion rate, bounce rate, or the drop-off step that pointed you at category pages. The lift means more once the reader knows the starting point.
What I looked at first
- Where shoppers stopped, by step, from landing page through to product page
- How the category page behaved on a phone, where most of the traffic was
- What a shopper could tell about a product without opening it
- Which products the merchandising order was actually surfacing
Hypothesis
If the category page gives shoppers enough signal to choose between products without opening each one, then more of them will reach a product page and buy, because the current page makes comparison expensive and shoppers abandon rather than tap through a dozen items.
Before and after
Before
Catalog grid with minimal product signal and merchandising that did not reflect what shoppers browsed for.
After
Rebuilt template with stronger product signal, clearer hierarchy, and a mobile layout built for scanning.
To add: real before and after screenshots. If the live pages have changed since, the Wayback Machine may hold the original.
The blog as a second front
The blog was treated as content rather than as a doorway. Rebuilding the template as a top of funnel acquisition surface lifted traffic 736% month over month, which brought a different kind of visitor into the same category pages I had just rebuilt.
Results
A caution I would give anyone reading these numbers: this was a sequential comparison on a live store, not a controlled split test. The lift is real and large, and seasonality and traffic mix are part of any month over month read. Saying so is what makes the rest of the portfolio credible.
What I took from it
Shipping the category page first and the blog second was the right order by accident. Fixing acquisition before the destination page converts just sends more people to a page that loses them.