Tips to Creating a More Usable E-Commerce Website

24/08/2015

Tips to Creating a More Usable E-Commerce Website

E-commerce is a fast growing phenomenon in today's online world. In many ways running an online shop is a lot more profitable than an offline shop as you have a lot fewer overheads – spending less money on premises, and staff, for starters.

Due to the fact that you have no offline store, your online store is central to your whole business, so a well designed, customer-friendly, effective website is essential.  Just as offline businesses make a big effort to get their stores looking great, their staff properly trained and their branding absolutely perfect, an e-commerce website needs to have the same attention to detail. 

The key to creating more usable websites is making customer friendly. A website that makes buying as quick and easy as possible, and is easy to navigate is certain to do better than one offering the same products but isn’t in the online shopping world.

Creating a more usable e-commerce website
There are a lot of factors involved in website design – and there needs to be a balance between what is best for you and what is best for your customers – or visitors. So, with this in mind, here are some tips to more usable website creation:

• Easy – The one thing that puts people off is testing their patience. That means slow loading pages, pictures which take ages to appear, or lengthy forms to fill in when they are buying something. User-friendly websites make it as easy as possible for them to buy your product. So cut out the massive pictures of forms asking about the name of their pet. If you are after extra information about your customers, try offering them something for free – an e-book, or a free sample, in exc hange for more information.

• Call to Action Buttons – If you have a specific action that you want your online shop visitors to do – especially if they have arrived at your site thanks to a specific advert or piece of content, make sure that you have a clear call to action button. For example, a 'buy now' button. Make it clearly stand out, through its colour, font and size.

• Language – Use Google Analytics to research where about in the world your site is being accessed from, and get your text translated to offer site access in that language(s).

• Product Pictures – Try to include as many photos of your products as possible. It is essential that potential customers can see pictures of what they are about to buy when they are shopping online. Try to get your photos as professional looking as possible, include a number of different angles and try to keep them as consistent as you can. Make sure that you have at least one photo per product – or more if you have a range of different colours, for example.

If you have any questions about e-commerce, buying and selling online, building effective websites and other online services, get in touch with Studioworx either via email ([email protected]), telephone (+44 (0)1603 274285) or the website (https://www.studioworx.co.uk).