MedMen.com
Destigmatizing cannabis with elevated customer experience. How MedMen became the first cannabis company to launch an omni-channel ecommerce platform.
Overview
In 2018, MedMen was quickly rising to fame as the premiere cannabis retailer in California, with an ambitious expansion plan to establish market dominance in five additional states. Having recently gone public on the Canadian Stock Exchange, the company was investing aggressively in building out the teams and technology needed to support its growing, intra-state retail portfolio.
At that time MedMen’s online presence was limited to a marketing splash page outlining the company’s mission to de-stigmatize cannabis by offering an accessible and welcoming shopping environment. The company has already been extremely successful in creating an elevated retail experience dubbed the Apple Store of weed. One of the primary objectives of the newly established product and engineering team was to establish a comparable ecommerce experience in order to increase awareness and reach, deepen the customer relationship, and generate new revenue streams.
Problem Statement
Destigmatize cannabis by making high-quality products accessible to all through an elevated online experience, so that customers can become more educated, and discover products they love.
Outcome
By the time I departed from MedMen in January 2022, we had grown Medmen.com into a mature ecommerce platform with pickup and delivery channels, a loyalty and rewards program, and fully integrated inventory and product data. At that time, MedMen.com served recreational and medical customers across 7 states and 29 retail locations.
While those who are familiar with the MedMen story are well aware of the ultimate failures of the business model, the time I spent there was among the most fulfilling years in my career. I was privileged to work alongside an incredibly talented team who worked diligently to deliver incremental value to customers and to the business. I experienced significant professional growth during my time there, beginning as an individual contributor, and ultimately being promoted to Director of UX. In this role, I interfaced with stakeholders regularly, contributed to the overarching product strategy and roadmap, and managed a team of designers.
While it would be challenging (and likely a tedious read) to document my entire 4 1/2 year tenure at MedMen, this case study highlights key product features and their impact at various points throughout the evolution of MedMen.com.
Impact
Contents
Product Discovery
Challenge
In order to help customers discover the cannabis products best suited to their needs, we needed to gain insight into how MedMen customers make purchase decisions, and how those decision points relate back to product attributes.
Methodology
In addition to conducting in-store visits, in which members of the product team interfaced directly with customers, we conducted extensive subject matter expert interviews with MedMen retail employees to gain a deeper understanding of our customers and products. Our research activities surfaced several key insights:
The majority of customers have a preferred method of consumption, and tend to shop within the same product category.
The product attributes customers value are unique by product category.
Brand loyalty is huge.
When we compared our customers’ categorization of products and the factors that influence purchase decisions against our product data in Microsoft NAV, we began to see some discrepancies:
Counter intuitive categorizations
Confusing lab test results
Lack of product variants
We surfaced our findings with the ERP team and worked together to recategorize products, introduce variants, and add missing product attributes. Additionally, we coordinated with the frontend development team to apply conversions and rounding in order to display test results intuitively.
Filter, Sort, Search
When implemented well, filter, sort, and search can be an incredibly powerful product discovery tool. In addition to ensuring our product categorization and filter parameters aligned with the customer’s mental model, we documented dozens of filter, sort, and search implementations to identify design patterns, and determine the most effective approach for our use case.
Product Details
The product detail page guides the purchase decision by surfacing the product attributes customers value. It also presents the opportunity to cross-sell based on our knowledge of the customer. For example, because MedMen customers are loyal to both product category and brand, it makes sense to merchandise the PDP page with other products within the same category and brand.
Visualizing Product Test Results
Our user research revealed that while test results are an important factor in decision-making, the relevant unit of measurement varies by product category. For example, customer shopping for flower or vaporizers are interested in learning about cannabinoid content as a percentage of the product's total mass, while those shopping for edibles, concentrates, and topicals only care to know the total milligrams of cannabinoids a product contains.
The raw product data did not always match the expected unit of measurement, so we worked with the front-end development team to perform automatic unit calculations and serving size calculations where relevant.
At the time of our user research, there had been a number of studies evaluating the physiological and psychological effects of the different botanical terpenes present in cannabis. Our most advanced customers were already using terpene profile as a way to predict a products' effects, and inform purchase decisions. For the majority of customers however, the concept was fairly new. In addition to displaying a products' 3 dominant terpenes, we included context and education about the different effects of each. Building on the heuristic match between the system and the real world, we commissioned an artist to create illustrations representing each terpene.
Anti-Inflammatory
Withdrawal Relief
Antioxidant
Antibiotic
Anti-Inflammatory
Antiproliferative
Anti-Depressant
Anti-Depressant
Anti-Inflammatory
Anesthetic
Euphoric
Analgesic
Anti-Inflammatory
Anti-Fungal
Memory Retention
Asthma Relief
Pain Relief
Antibiotic
Anti- Fungal
Antioxidant
Online Order Platform
Geolocation & Order Initiation
Challenge
MedMen’s product offering varies by both state and store location. Due to this sometimes significant variance in inventory, it is critical that users enter a shopping experience appropriate to their location and preferred order method. Our implementation of online ordering pre-dated the development of a global inventory strategy and shopping cart transfer feature. At that time, the cost of funneling users to the wrong store location was severe. At best, the user experienced a high degree of friction re-creating their order at the correct store location. At worst, they abandoned the order completely, never to return.
To complicate matters, cannabis retailers are legally required to collect age verification upfront. Our data showed that we were facing about 10% drop-off on the age gate alone (we were able to reduce this to 8% after a number of optimizations). We were extremely wary of further increasing the barrier to entry with additional user tasks such as location verification or store selection.
Solution
We developed a geolocation and order initiation feature with several goals in mind:
Lower the barrier to entry by exposing users to relevant products directly from the homepage
Provide increasing levels of education about store location and ordering options along the user journey
Spare users from the potential friction of building orders with the incorrect order intent or store location.
How it Works
IP Detection
Use IP to determine the user’s zip code, and default to the regional home store.
Progressive Investment
Initiate the homepage experience in browse mode, and encourage users to specify order intent (pickup or delivery) when they navigate deeper into the shopping experience.
Explicit Intent
Require users to confirm order intent if they attempt to add an item to their shopping bag in browse mode.
Global Entry Point
Provide users with a global entry point to update order intent and pickup store location
Meaningful Alternatives
When a user’s preferred order intent is unavailable, offer alternatives.
Checkout
Challenge
The initial implementation of online order checkout averaged a 2.5% conversion rate, which was promising in light of the legal and compliance constraints. Guest checkout, which is well documented to increase ecommerce conversion rate, is prohibited in regulated industries such as cannabis and alcohol. Furthermore, cannabis retailers are legally required to collect legal name, birth date, and ID number at registration, requiring more time and focus from users compared to other account creation experiences. Analysis of funnel and behavioral analytics, as well as security reports revealed a few key opportunities for improvement:
Solution
After a series of iterations and A/B testing, we optimized the checkout experience to minimize high-risk exit points and streamline the user flow through registration and checkout.
Additionally, we introduced name and birthdate verification as a modal task, creating a small degree of intentional friction in order to reduce order cancellations. Lastly, we introduced “delivery threshold” as a configurable order value, which if exceeded would trigger an inline component prompting the user to upload a photo of their ID.
Impact
The geolocation & order initiation feature and checkout optimizations were complimentary initiatives which can be attributed to an increase in average conversion rate from 2.5% to 3.5%. Guiding users through order type and pickup store decisions earlier in the shopping experience reduced the need for modifications at checkout, enabling us to create a more focused flow and prioritize user tasks that reduce risk and ensure orders can be completed successfully at the point of pickup or delivery.
Loyalty & Retention
MedMen Buds Rewards
Challenge
On average, cannabis dispensary customers are made up of 60% first-time visitors and 40% returning customers1. Compared to first-timers, regular customers represent significantly higher value2:
- Zenreach Walk-thru Data, 2019
- What is the Lifetime Value of a Retail Customer of Cannabis? Happy Cabbage
MedMen sales and customer data revealed that MedMen stores saw a similar 60/40 split of new versus returning customers, with an even higher return visit frequency of once every 7.8 days. Furthermore, the data revealed that after the third store visit, customers are very likely to become regulars, with dropoff rates much lower compared to the first and second visit. In response, the MedMen Marketing team evaluated a number of customer retention tactics, and identified substantial opportunity in rolling out a branded customer loyalty program.
Problem Statement
Build trust and loyalty in the MedMen brand by creating an exclusive experience customers value above competitors in order to increase customer retention and drive sales revenue.
Solution
The product team partnered with marketing to gather requirements and evaluate potential solutions and platforms, ultimately aligning on Clutch as our CRM and loyalty platform of choice. Existing customer data was migrated to Clutch, which we then integrated with MedMen.com and the Point of Sale System via API.
In order to drive opt-ins, we designed a number of entry points:
Homepage → enrollment landing page
We merchandised the secondary homepage tile to promote the launch of the rewards program and drive traffic to the enrollment landing page.
Marketing email → enrollment landing page
Existing customers who were already subscribed to marketing emails were targeted with an email blast inviting them to enroll in MedMen Buds and start earning points on every order.
Enrollment
New customers are given the option to sign up for rewards as part of account creation.
Account
Existing customers can sign up for MedMen Buds from the rewards section inside account.
Shopping Bag
Users who are signed in, but not already enrolled in rewards are given the opportunity to enroll from the shopping bag, with the context that they can begin earning points for their current purchase.
Online Checkout
The shopping bag enrollment component persists to the checkout page, either retaining the user’s opt-in, or providing a final opportunity to enroll before checkout.
Incentive Structure
The finance and marketing teams aligned on a point-based model in which customers earn 1 point for every $1 spend, and receive a $5 discount every 200 points. We optimized the user experience to create clarity and transparency around the rewards model, and incentivize users to spend more.
Earn
Get rewarded with points each time you shop.
Burn
Cash in your points on your favorite products.
Extras
Get special offers and early access to exclusive sales.
At the account level, users have visibility into their rewards point balance, available rewards, and rewards transaction history.
At checkout, users get feedback about how many rewards points they will earn for the order, and have the opportunity to apply rewards dollars and other promotions to their order.
Pain Points
One of the main pain points we faced early on was a proliferation in duplicate profiles due to customers opting in with two or more different email addresses, or opting in in-store prior to creating an online profile. The end result for the customers was missing points or rewards points fragmented across accounts. Shortly after the initial rollout of rewards, we released a self-service tool for customers to merge profiles, as well as automated matching based on ID at checkout.
Self-service rewards account consolidation.
Automated rewards profile matching flow based on ID verification.
Enhancements
After the initial feature set, we released two enhancements to create more value for the customer, leverage the psychological appeal of exclusivity, and extend our reach through social validation.
Buds exclusive promotions
Promotions, including those exclusive to Buds only are promoted from the menu landing state.
Users who are not enrolled in rewards have the opportunity to sign up from the shopping bag, or at checkout in order to see the exclusive discount applied.
Refer a friend
Rewards customers are incentivized with a 10% off coupon for every referral sent, and 100 points for every successful signup. Sign up attribution is tracked in Clutch via unique referral urls.
SMS Marketing
MedMen relied primarily on OOH and email marketing prior to 2020, when the state of California lifted restrictions previously prohibiting cannabis companies from SMS marketing. Marketing stakeholders did not hesitate to capitalize on the opportunity, citing the many benefits of SMS marketing compared to email:
SMS
Incentive Structure
In order to continue the momentum of the rewards program while also driving SMS opt-ins, the marketing team aligned on a $5 rewards bonus for customers who opt in to SMS and MedMen Buds. Existing loyalty customers simply needed to opt-in to SMS in order to receive the $5 bonus, whereas customers who were not already MedMen Buds would need to opt in to SMS and sign up for rewards.
Challenges
Due to the double requirement, we needed to collect different data from users depending on their rewards status. We set the logic so that known rewards members need only provide the bare minimum required to opt-in (phone number and legal consent), while non-rewards or anonymous users must provide phone number and legal consent and are routed to the sign in/sign up page to enroll in rewards if they have not yet done so.
2. Logged out customer - this user is presented additional optional fields (which will be passed though to their profile) and directed sign in/ sign up and join MedMen Buds if they have not yet done so.
Driving Opt-Ins
We created 5 different opt-in opportunities in order to reach users at various points in the customer journey.
2. Marketing email to landing page
5. Exit pop
Impact
The combined impact of rewards and SMS marketing resulted in: