How Ritual Used Strella’s AI-Moderated Interviews to Optimize Pricing and Drive 24% Revenue Growth

Ritual, a leading direct-to-consumer supplement brand, was looking to test customer comprehension of its new pricing structure on their website - including their new a-la-carte purchase option. With a tight timeline and the need to obtain actionable insights quickly, the team realized that traditional research methods—such as live interviews—wouldn’t cut it.

"Without Strella, we couldn’t have completed this research due to our tight timeline. Live interviews take a couple weeks to schedule and moderate, plus synthesizing the findings can take 2-3 times as long as the interviews themselves," says Lauren Jordan, Principal Product Designer at Ritual.

That’s when the company decided to try Strella's AI-moderated interviews to deliver actionable, high-quality insights —without the long turnaround time typically associated with live interviews. The Ritual team was looking to:

1. Assess consumer understanding of the differences between the one-time purchase, 1-month subscription, and 3-month subscription options.
2. Identify areas of confusion or hesitation when choosing a purchase or subscription plan.
3. Evaluate the clarity of pricing tiers and the associated benefits
4. Test consumer ability to confidently make a decision without requiring further clarification or support.

Outcomes: 

Ritual used Strella to assess customer understanding of their website’s new pricing model, allowing them to quickly implement and act on the insights gained. “What would have been a 3-week process was condensed into just a few days. It wasn’t just about being more efficient—it was also about getting better quality insights,” Lauren shared.

The data speaks for itself. Ritual conducted an A/B test to assess the effectiveness of a new pricing model compared to the existing structure. Over the test period, they tracked performance of the new pricing and the control group, and saw significant improvements in customer behavior and overall business performance:

• 24% increase in net revenue per user: The introduction of a new pricing structure and options led to higher revenue per user.
• 19% increase in initial order value: Clearer pricing messaging helped drive higher purchase amounts, with customers feeling more confident in their buying decisions.
• 21% decrease in the rate of same-day cancellations: Offering more purchasing options allowed customers to select the best fit for their needs, reducing post-purchase cancellations.
• 100% Ritual team NPS: The Ritual team completed the project as enthusiastic Strella promoters and are eager to continue leveraging the tool for customer research in 2025.

“The success we saw in this gave us so much more confidence in our rollout strategy,” Lauren shared. “At first, we had an earlier version of the pricing model that we rolled back because we just didn’t have the insight to know what about it wasn’t working. But after testing with Strella, we were able to make more informed decisions, and from here on out we will be able to have a more robust testing and iteration strategy,” Lauren noted.

Interview Experience: 

The interview experience contained two embedded, clickable Figma prototypes: one with Ritual’s standard product descriptions and pricing, and one with their end-of-year sale. As the participants navigated through the check out process, Strella asked questions and dynamic follow ups to test perceived benefits, value and pricing comprehension. Watch a sample interview below:

From the start, the experience was a game-changer. Strella’s AI-driven platform allowed the team to run interviews efficiently, without compromising on the quality of insights.  “I’m so pleasantly surprised by how organic the conversations are. The participants gave really thorough responses, which made me feel reassured that we could use Strella for something like this and get quality results,” says Lauren. With Strella, the team could also gather responses from a larger sample of customers without the risk of interviewer bias. The AI moderated interviews helped participants feel more at ease, leading to more honest and organic feedback. “Every interviewee has an inherent fear of being judged during a comprehension test, but AI-moderated interviews completely eliminate that. Participants feel more comfortable, as they’re speaking to a computer, but the conversation still flows naturally. They tend to share much more, and their feedback feels more honest,” noted Max Tanbara, Product Designer.

In traditional interviews, researchers are left to interpret feedback and guide a call in real-time, which can lead to implicit bias. Strella's AI-first approach offers a more objective picture of results: “Being the person that is writing the script, doing the facilitation and then doing the analysis, you're bound to miss certain insights. So I think it's not just a more efficient way to run the test, but actually there's a lot more objectivity in the findings as a result. And it really does feel like there is like no stone left unturned because everything's fully documented,” says Lauren. This mitigates human error, and also frees up time for the team to more quickly implement and action the findings. “Strella really removes human error from the process, which is incredible. But at the same time, the human nuance and curiosity is still maintained because we can ask questions to Strella and get immediate answers back,” Max noted.

With customer insights now driving their pricing strategy, Ritual is poised for even greater success in 2025. Check out Ritual’s end-of-year sale going on now!