Client UX design & build: Delicious

Digital

Continuous improvement and evolution for millions of users

Rob HoyRachel PeatJordan Norris
Discussed by Rob, Rachel and Jordan

166

%

increase in organic sales

Rachel Peat, Senior Project Manager

This is one of our biggest sites – and also one of our biggest challenges.

Jordan Norris, Senior Developer

Yeah it is a beast of a site – but we’ve got it covered!

Rachel

We started working with the team at Delicious back in 2018, and we kicked off with a mammoth site re-build. But we’ve done so much more since then, haven’t we Jordan?

"Zest has supported Eye to Eye Media since early 2018 for front and back-end development, UI work, UX thinking, project management and more - a real all-round digital agency."

Vic Grimshaw, Head of digital

Speach Bubble
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8000

Recipes served daily

Jordan

Loads. I mean, they have thousands of pages, and it’s so important to them that the site is up and running to the very best of its ability 24/7. 

They rely on the site for revenue generation, users need to be able to find what they want, and fast –  so it’s a massive task and they’ve got to trust us with their most valuable asset. 

Rachel

We’re more than a dev team to them, we’re tech support and strategy too. From ongoing optimisation around user journeys, dev, and SEO to really helping them with the site strategy, and making proactive recommendations to future-proof it.

Jordan

And we have to constantly be on top of the changes Google makes – like the latest CLS* update – so that the site doesn’t lose ranking.

*That’s Cumulative Layout Shift – or for those less technical, stopping everything from jumping around the page. 

Rachel

So for our team, that’s a solid 65 hours of Javascript review, to audit the code, and refactor it across the whole site.

Jordan

Yeah so the pages load quicker and Google doesn’t penalise the site. 

Rachel

…..and Delicious’ users can continue to visit and consume content in their thousands.

Jordan

Millions, isn’t it?

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3.5

m

Monthly peak time users

Delicious magazine food imagery Delicious magazine logo

Rachel

During Covid when everyone was stuck at home and desperate to cook their way out of the boredom, site visits went up across the category. The work we’d been doing on the site, migrating to a new infrastructure to introduce load balancing and eradicate outages for example, meant that Delicious overtook their main competitor for the first time ever.

Jordan

Which feels pretty good. 

Rachel

It’s a great feeling, to see how everything we do is making an impact, from fixing those pesky little bugs, to applying new ads across the site – it all adds up to a really happy client.

We also work closely with the whole team there, so content delivery and SEO – making sure that we’re all talking, reviewing and taking the right action. Without that communication and full transparency, it’s impossible to manage a site of that size.

Jordan

I love looking at ‘what next’ – constantly looking at ways to improve the site, and the experience. We’ve got loads of recommendations on the table for Delicious, so let’s see what the next few months has in store!

Rachel

You and a load of code?!

Google Page Experience

Problem:Solution:

Slow LCP (Largest Contentful Paint)

The time a website takes to show the user the largest content on the screen, complete and ready for interaction.

  • Deferred some assets so that they're loaded after render
  • Set image dimensions on all images across the site
  • Optimised theme-related Javascript
  • Removed plug-ins on pages where not required
  • Added backup fonts that display while custom fonts are loading
  • Optimised mobile menu HTML
  • Implemented lazyloading of images

High FID (First Input Delay)

The measurment of the time it takes for a browser to respond to a site visitor's first interaction with the site while the site is loading.

  • Optimised theme-related JavaScript
  • Removed plug-ins on pages where not required

High CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift)

The unexpected shifting of webpage elements while the page is still downloading.

  • Removed all layout shifts by adding image dimensions across the site