How To Get The Most Out Of Your Ecommerce Website

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Stripping out the excess of your store to get customers what they want

A successful ecommerce site has one goal in mind, closing the sale to turn a profit. The easier it is for the customer to get from the home page of your site to the checkout page, the more sales you will have. Adding features, plugins, paragraphs or images without that goal in mind will do nothing but hinder the process. Keeping your ecommerce site simple will go a long way in making the sale and encourage customers to return to your site. This is true on all major ecommerce sites. Let’s first look at the big one, Amazon.

amazon

Instantly you are greeted with product sliders and galleries that show items to click on. Clicking on any of these items will take you directly where you need to go to purchase the product. These are features with a single goal in mind, making it easier to checkout. The search bar is long and noticeable with “Shop by Department” directly next to it making it simple and easy to get to where you need to go. Notice how we don’t see testimonials, introduction paragraphs, or scrolling graphics of the storefront. With a few simple images you instantly know what the company is and where to go to get what you want.
Now let’s take a look at a lesser known company, Warby Parker.

 

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If you had no idea what Warby Parker was before you saw the storefront, you instantly do now. They sell eyeglasses. They didn’t need an introduction paragraph or a storefront image to portray that information to the customer because the customer did not need it. They now know what the company does and where to go to purchase glasses. Let the design do the talking.
Finally, let’s take a look at Macys. In this example, the poor design choices hurt the overall user experience.

 

macys

 

Brand recognition is the only thing Macys has going for it. The design is unorganized, repetitive and confusing. There is no inspired imagery but instead four sections of percentage discounts, two identical navigations, and an extreme focus on a current sale instead on user experience. Macys wanted to portray a clearance sale to attract purchases, however the confusing organization and multiple information sections make it almost impossible to easily deduce how much you are getting off and it loses focus on user experience. There are actually zero image examples of the products they sell on the initial view of the home page making the user go further into the site to get to exactly where they want to be.

Above all else the goal of an ecommerce site is to get the product to your customer. It is easy to get caught up in the excitement of a new design and lose track of that single simple objective, don’t make that mistake. You should be able to convey your entire business in one sentence and nine times out of ten that is all you will need to get the message across. Add testimonials throughout the site with image backgrounds that serve a purpose. Add product images throughout the site that they can quickly navigate too. Leave the history of your store for the About Us Page. Keep the site simple, organized and always remember the goal is to close the sale.

WebTek is recognized as a top E-commerce Design & Development Companies on DesignRush.  If you need help with your ecommerce website, please contact us.

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