I’ve recently been looking into E-commerce, and can now offer it as a service to my clients. I’ve come across a hell of a lot of online shops (I do a lot of online shopping), and have to say a lot of them look TERRIBLE. Have you ever clicked on a link from google only to be confronted with a usability nightmare?? I think selling success comes from a site looking trustworthy and a simple-to-use interface. That sounds pretty obvious doesn’t it? Why are so many online stores looking so bad then, I’m tempted to show a few bad ones, but that maybe be a tad harsh… was looking into dropshipping candles, and top of google is this; now I’m sure they get sales, but not from me - now I reckon they could easily double their sales with a better website. There are some excellent out of the box designs that come with both open source free platforms (prestashop/opencart both look ok without any customisation).
Obviously cost is a major factor and the majority of people who want to sell something online wouldn’t have a clue how to set up a database, let alone install and configure an e-commerce platform. For this reason alone I’ve read horror stories about clients spending £12000+ on a very bad, essentially useless ‘e-commerce’ site because they’re lack of knowledge has been taken advantage of. Truth is, it’s not THAT expensive to set up an online store, entering all the products is the slow laborious part (DB configuration isn’t a laugh either).
It’s important to distinguish between the site; or the tool used to sell to customers, and the products themselves. A great site won’t sell shit products, just as a shit site won’t sell (many) great products. But as a web designer we can at least start the client off in the right direction with a few key points to keep in mind:
- Keep it clean: No point having all the fancy crap that we could get away with on a static site, your selling the products not your design. Keep to sleek, clear navigation and categories. I’m liking play.com design, and can usually find what I’m looking for sharpish. It’s attractive without being overdone.
- Balance the look and usability: How easy is it to find a product you’re looking for? If it’s a pain to find, change it. While usuability is VERY important as with all websites, I think it’s important to generate professionalism through solid design. Building customer trust will sell products.
- Show the cart all the time: The cart should always be in view, keeping up that total price and making the customer aware of what they’re adding is so important.
- Don’t force the customer to register when buying a product: Offer the chance to simply checkout without registering, think I read some mad statistic 60% customers leave website on checking out.
- Make sure the categories are one of the first things the customer sees: Not being able to find a product is just annoying, horizontal or vertical nav or both is fine.
- Checkout button should be easy to find: So they’ve added whatever product tickles their fancy, now they want to buy it..if there’s no checkout button, you can say goodbye to the sale. Best thing to do is keep the checkout button near the cart as well as on the navigation.
- Build trust using trusted brands: Whack on some credit card logos, paypal, verified, logos which really every store should have, and unconsciously gives us a warm feeling inside that says ‘oh they accept trusted payments methods, here’s my money’.
- Bottom line: Buyers are become very adept at shopping online, with all the price comparisons and competition about, it’s important to make it as easy as possible to buy the product, for example amazons one click checkout, see a product you like, you buy it, simple.
All these points are pretty obvious and should be seen on all e-commerce sites, all we’re doing is making it easier on the customer. As web designers, it gives us plenty of opportunities to get out there and make these store owners rich by improving their e-stores.
Tue, Oct 13, 2009
E-commerce