10 tips to improve your customers' e-commerce experience

This is important as it allows visitors to instantly find the particular product they are looking for. Placing this in a prominent area and keeping it consistent on every page is vital as visitors may want to find a product at any point during their dwell time on the website. Giving the visitor the ability to further refine their search categories such as price bands, colours and specific brands can be advantageous and will hopefully lead them quickly to their desired product and convert into an online sale. Behind the scenes it can also be helpful to monitor and keep track of visitor’s product keywords as these will indicate popular searches. The products that are more regularly searched for should be prominently placed on the website homepage for the customer to find and purchase quickly.

Keeping the overall design simple can helps emphasise and draw attention to the products. This enables users to find things easily without unnecessary distractions luring them away from making a purchase. Showcasing the products effectively on the homepage gives the visitor an insight into the product range from the moment they arrive at the site, which can be further improved by providing basic information such as name, price and a link to complementary products. Actual product pages should include large good quality photos, multiple views of the product and zoom in functionality to entice the visitor with a better representation of the product. This page should contain full product details, description and pricing.

It is important to feature key contact information such as telephone numbers and email in a prominent area of every page. This gives the visitor the opportunity to contact the company if they have an issue or query. Although it can depend on your target market, some visitors can are still very cautious about purchasing online and having this in place can offer reassurance that the website is legitimate. Having a good FAQ section removes a lot of the uncertainty which may cloud a purchasing decision, at Eyekiller we have more recently been adding these into the checkout process also prevents ‘buyer’s remorse’. An enquiry form is another effective way to submit a question that has not been covered in the FAQ section, but these must be well managed by and answered promptly, as delay could result in negative feedback and the loss of a customer.

Keeping the checkout process to a minimum number of steps which are easy to follow makes the experience more user friendly. If possible it is best to allow express checkout process to enable visitor purchase without logging or signing up. It is important to keep any forms short as visitors do not want to fill in lengthy pages of required information.
We often use orientation techniques to clearly define the checkout process, build visitor confidence and increase conversion rates and minimise abandoning the checkout process.

Presenting visitors with complementary ‘You may also like’ products is a great way of increasing online sales. However, it is important that a product you are suggesting is actually relevant to the visitors and their purchases. It’s also important not to be ‘pushy’ with how you present these as nobody likes to have products added directly into their shopping carts.

The navigation is a vital part of all websites. Ensuring this is clear and consistent in all pages and possibly introducing sub navigation makes product browsing more user friendly. Making sure all typography is in a consistent font face and spaced appropriately prevents readability issues. Any paragraphs of text should be short and concise allowing the user to obtain information quickly.

With particular target markets, generations are being converted to communicating and promoting all sorts of things through social media channels, such as Facebook, Twitter and Youtube. Using these platforms effectively to promote and engage with potential customers is critical and can be very cost effective. Examples of this could be special offers, online exclusives or dealing with customer enquiries. Other ways include sending out regular newsletters via email to promote products.

If there are different types of customers visiting the website, it is important to feature clear calls to action that guide them to the area that relates to them. If the website includes a login area, having a friendly tone of voice throughout these pages makes the user feel valued. People appreciate a personal touch. You could also personalise any e-marketing material to ensure existing customers and their loyalty are valued.

Featuring popular products or best sellers informs the visitors of the products that are most wanted and purchased. Visitors like to read feedback from other customers who have bought the same product. Having these reviews in a prominent place on the product page could influence the decision to make a purchase. Recommendations could also be based on what the visitor has searched previously or added to their cart.

Showing details of shipping and costs to different countries lets users know what is available to them and removes concerns about hidden charges they may incur. It is important to display these clearly and early in the process, preferably on the product information page or the shopping cart. This prevents users filling out required details and then discovering the product cannot be shipped to their location, resulting in frustration or seeking the product elsewhere.

Once your e-commerce website has been launched, it is vital that visitor activity and interactions are regularly analysed. Minor adjustments can make a major impact on a website’s performance. Making small changes and monitoring the success of these will enable you to achieve the optimum results. By deploying an effective Customer Experience Analytics system, you can keep an eye on site visitors' behaviour in real-time to see what aspects of your site engage well with customers and, more importantly, which areas may not. Eyekiller use Google Analytics on all websites which we develop and regularly liaise with our customers to ensure that they are getting the best from their e-commerce website.