ECOMMERCE WEBSITE DESIGN: TIPS TO STAND OUT

Every experienced in Ecommerce knows that better interface experience equals higher sale conversion. Even if your idea is innovative and trendsetter one, your ecommerce website design has to capture visitors right off the bat, and in order to do that, its design has to be visuals-wise and captivating.

SLICES OF YOUR ECOMMERCE WEBSITE DESIGN

1. Homepage Design

The home page is one of the most important parts of your ecommerce website design because it catches the customer’s first impression of your business. Your home page represents your enterprise’s image, which should serve to build clients’ trust immediately. It must also catch visitor interest and make customers comfortable enough to stick around and willing to discover your best services.

2. Product Pages Design

It’s the quality of your product pages that plays an important role in a customer’s decision to buy from your business. You need to clear all specified information about each product, but the page design should decide how well customers can experience and understand that information. Your ecommerce website design should also never go easy on the display of your product images (such as through poor color contrast or an overly-packed background). Product pages also should own a good technical level, so this is a great point to enhance speed website index like Google AMP.

3. Category Pages

It seems that customers spend pretty much of their time on your website go through your category pages. This enables them to compare similar products and look for the items they need. Your category pages should be attractive at sight and simple to navigate, in order to make the customer’s shopping journey as smooth as possible.

4. View Cart Page

The customer’s View Cart page is where they can inspect the list of items that currently reside in their shopping cart. They must be able to change quantities, remove items, and view their order total. The customer should be easier to deal with a higher total during checkout and not abandoning their cart thanks to real-time shipping and tax calculations. The View Cart page, as well as any other pages, should be easy to navigate and provide detailed information on the chosen products.

5. Checkout Page

At the very last moment, it’s possible that you could lose a conversion at the final destination – the checkout page. In order to prevent this from happening to your business, customers should be able to check out as fast and easy as possible. The page layout must be clear enough to understand, and all required fields must be obvious, as should all checkboxes and descriptions (such as “Shipping address same as billing”). If the customer accidentally makes a mistake and tries to proceed without completing the compulsory fields, the checkout should not delete the already filled information and force them to start over. In short, your checkout must be designed from front to back for speed and ease of use.

6. My Account Page

The My Account page provides customers with personal information, their own records on past orders, reward points, store credit, etc. Users visiting their My Account page are often looking for information that will affect an immediate purchase. For example, a customer may want to view a previous order so they can reorder the same item or review the product’s quality after use without wasting time going through product pages. Moreover, they might also want to check reward point balances to calculate the total price of their available cart. An able ecommerce website design provides the customer with a simple and immediate way to access this information on their My Account page and has a positive influence on their purchasing.

YOUR WEBSITE DESIGN’S CHECKLIST

1. Complex filters

Almost any product may come in various sizes, colors, materials, etc. This would apply to pretty much all customers as their demands are also different and complicated on many levels. If your site provides users with a clear and adequate system of filters by different parameters, which match the users’ demand, even the most challenging customer will be pleased to experience every corner of your ecommerce website design.

2. Keep the search box in sight

Under the main page of every successful e-commerce website is the dominating search bar. It takes years of experience to come up with such a small but brilliant up-sale solution. When a user accesses to your online store’s front page and doesn’t find the item he needs, he always seeks for the search field – it is just an instinct. So make sure your website does not hide the search bar as users scroll down the page. Of course, it is relevant for web stores, in which search bars work correctly.

3. In-stock / out of stock

Eliminating temporarily unavailable items from the site is pretty much not good for SEO technically. But from the business perspective, is it good to fail your site visitors’ expectations? Is your website content thoughtful enough when customers finally find what they have been looking for, add it to the cart and the only thing they get is a cold answer “Sorry, the product is out of stock”? After all, in the end, people bring you the money, not the search engine bots. So put your customers’ experience first. Create an ecommerce website design with product availability information prominent, so it could be seen at once and add fields such as “Notify me when the item is in stock” or “Add to wish cart”.

4. Prominent calls to action

Encourage your visitors to explore the site. If you are running a sale or a promotion on a selection of products, be sure to have this on the home page and include a call to action like “See Our Latest Deals” and include a link to a product listing of all products that are included in the sale.

Other examples of call to actions include “See our range of birthday ideas”. Your prominent call to action must be relevant to the product you sell.

5. “You may also like”

The Iconic utilized a feature on their website that provided product recommendations based on what other customers have bought (i.e. customers who bought X, also bought Y) to maximum effect. It helps to create a personalized shopping experience on your website and also upsells the product.

6. Short product description

Keep the product descriptions as concise as possible. Customers are unlikely to read wordy product description unless if they want to. If products have a lengthy product description, and the customer is interested, add a “read more” underneath the concise version of the product description to allow the customer to gain further information.

7. Product photos from different angles

Show a variety of photos showing different angles of the product. If possible, add a “zoom in” feature so customers can get a closer look at the product.

8. Final cost

One more rule: show the final cost on the product page or shopping cart page. There is nothing more outrageous than extra charges for delivery which a customer finds out about only on the last stage. It puts off him immediately. You may set the single rate for delivery for the whole territory or offer delivery free of charge – just make necessary calculations to set up the right scheme.  In case you can’t afford this, include delivery cost calculation on the product page, so the price is automatically calculated depending on the customer location.

9. Every pixel

Andy has found a great example: organic food internet store Abel & Cole. The author assures that each pixel works for site success. When developing a new showcase page, thinking over a customer’s actions and impression, amending existing online store, always question yourself, why this or that block should have such look exactly, why it is better than other variants, and most importantly – how much it can contribute to your success and customers satisfaction.

10. SEO

Under the circumstances of steady growth of the ecommerce market which becomes more and more competitive, SEO – is one the keys to success. The design may have to do with SEO as well. For example, search engines like right HTML coding with the correct use of heading tags H (in the place where they really need to be used).

WAY TO GET YOUR IDEAL WEBSITE DESIGN

1. Building your own team

When designing a logo for your business brand, finding someone who can do everything from A-Z to every job is not difficult. But to create an efficient ecommerce website design, sometimes one person is not enough to handle everything. Although there are individuals and organizations that provide comprehensive website design solutions, you should also consider building your in-house team if the business’s budget is limited.

Website designers – web designers: They take your ideas and turn them visually visible so you can imagine what your website will be like in the future. This work is mostly done in Adobe Photoshop or similar graphic design software.

UX design (user experience) and UI (user interface) focus on what ecommerce website design layout that would directly impact the user. For example, they will help you decide where to place all those buttons or create the look of the navigation bar so that it encourages users to interact more with your website. Though there are basic differences between UX design and UI, in most cases, the job of the web designer and UI / UX designer is quite similar. Therefore if you’re planning to save money, it’s not too difficult to hire someone who has both of these skills.

The website developer will receive the blueprints from the designer and present them on the web in code language. Getting into more details, there are many code languages ​​available, and most programmers only understand one.

Front end programmers focus on what we see on the website including (images, text, effects, menus, page layouts, etc.)

2. Hiring freelancers

If your business still needs a custom-made interface but don’t want to spend too much of your budget, you can choose from the available templates, then customize specific items.
One of the best platforms for building an eCommerce website design is WordPress. Although it is initially a blog site, WordPress has become one of the most popular CMS on the Internet (providing about 30% of the total number of sites on the Internet). There are thousands of different template templates to choose from.
You can hire an experienced freelancer custom these themes on WordPress to create unique and different websites, along with an easy-to-manage back-end data system.

• Advantages

The first thing to mention is that the option is affordable. Since they perform tasks as an individual so they will not have to pay the fees and taxes that a business must bear. Therefore, the cost they require is also much lower than businesses.  However, it is safe to choose an individual with adequate price because all the individuals who offer too much lower prices are often fraudulent or provide low-quality ecommerce website design. In general, if you are able to connect with the right people, the quality of the product is pretty much acceptable because the freelancer is the nature of the people who have experience working at agency companies.

• Disadvantages

Finding the right professional is quite difficult for customers. It is often that they are referred from an acquaintance. The security of warranty, maintenance, after-sales is also a problem because personal projects often do not have the legal contract which should be required.

3. Corporate with a suitable agency

Typically these businesses will own a huge website creation and management system with the following outstanding advantages.

• Advantage

These agencies usually own a legal name, being able to sign contracts and issue invoices. Moreover, they have expertise and skills for in-depth operations in website design. The process of consulting, designing, warranty and maintenance is clear and especially, they usually accept to do projects on demand so the ecommerce website design will be at the customer’s discretion. Especially the biggest advantage of this option is that you are a website owner and can easily cooperate with another third party if you are not satisfied with your current partner.

• Disadvantages

Because of following the design and requirements of customers, the implementation time usually takes  2-3 months for a project. Besides, too many companies operating in this area lead to confusion on the market. And finally, if you want a quality website, the cost you need to bear is usually quite expensive.

WORTH WATCHING ECOMMERCE WEBSITE DESIGN

1. Bon Bon Bon

Bon Bon Bon is an artisan chocolate company based out of Detroit that is full of spirit and swagger.

When looking to expand their brick-and-mortar presence online, Bon Bon Bon needed complete customization and responsive design to showcase their creativity and engage online consumers.

An original Shopify site failed to allow for necessary customizations and thus revenue goals. A platform switch and redesign by BigCommerce partner, Brand Labs, helped the Bon Bon Bon team attain their visual and UX goals.

According to the Bon Bon Bon team:

Brand Labs, working with web designers from Skidmore Studios in Detroit, created a funky, user-friendly ecommerce website design that captures the spirit of the BonBonBon product, the Babes Babes Babes (a rad group of ladies, keeping hand-u-facturing alive in Detroit), and of course the chocolate.

The team also created a great custom option called: Build a Box Box Box.

This feature allows customers to select their favorite confections, add them to the corrugated cardboard box, and deliver them wherever they want.

They can even Add one Random Bon! for fun.

The ability to create and design an ecommerce store unique for their clientele is what keeps this fun-loving brand top of mind for chocolate aficionados.

2. SkullCandy

Skullcandy’s site comes to life with great colors and product photography.

The design process and consideration of their audience was key to making a site that would stand out among the competition.

According to the Skullcandy team:

Skullcandy pushes the limits in everything they do from their products, their music, corporate culture. And with no exception, it also applies to the BigCommerce platform for their digital ecommerce channel.

A recent replatform effort launched in February. The design was also elevated to take advantage of more freedom within the full-service BigCommerce platform.

Another great aspect of the Skullcandy ecommerce website interface is the ease of use and frictionless flow of the customer journey engages the user at every turn. Blending product with brand and brand with product, you gain a sense of the brand and quality of their products without effort.

Designed as a mobile-first experience in line with Skullcandy’s typical customer, the design is unmatched in delivering engaging imagery at lightning speed.

3. Unleash The Beast

Anyone old enough to have a fondness for the 1980s television will doubtless recall The Dukes of Hazzard. It followed the madcap exploits of the Duke brothers and their customized ‘General Lee’ that made a generation fall in love with the Dodge Charger. Fast-forward 40 years and Dodge is still going strong, with modern models of its iconic Charger and Challenger muscle cars available to nostalgic petrol heads.

Unleash the Beast is a Mexican brochure site from agency GrupoW that offers a digital tour of both cars. A brief intro sequence transitions to dark frontal shots of each, with headlight animations and ignition audio-triggered on mouse rollover. Glitching text effects encourage visitors to swipe left or right while selecting car loads stylized video clips followed by an interactive tour.

Dragging the viewport swings the camera around the sleek bodywork to find clickable hotspots detailing core features and stats. Animation and roaring sound clips add bursts of immersion, while the looping electronica soundtrack makes Unleash The Beast a snarling multimedia blast best enjoyed with headphones.

4. Beat By Dre

Headphones aren’t the easiest product to promote visually—after all, it’s the quality of their sound that counts to buyers. Beats by Dre still manages to make their ecommerce website design interesting with a loud red color. The company combines the bright hue with other visual elements to lead buyers to shop CTAs. For example, the white streak in the photo above underlines the “Explore” button against the red.

5. Leader Bag Co

Lest we forget sometimes, ‘nice’ and ‘comfortable’ can, when done well enough, actually be very effective in web design. It’s also not a bad trait to look for in backpacks and satchels either. This segues seamlessly into the charm of Leader Bag Co.

This ecommerce website design provides a lovely reminder that the virtues of clean simplicity aren’t a lost art. Meanwhile, it added just enough dynamism and quirkiness to excite. It also communicates brand messages of practicality and child-friendly appeal by applying Lotta Nieminen’s playful illustrations to brochure photography.

Very subtle dashes of parallax scrolling add enough motion to the clusters of color, contrasting well against the template’s largely white and grey palette. Rollover tiles, badges and buttons offer links through to large, beautifully shot products. These would do a top job of putting each bag into big or little hands. A zoom feature offers enough resolution to examine weave-level detail. In the meanwhile chunky UI controls make adding selections to the cart thoughtfully painless.

While the ecommerce website design is entirely framed by such Leader Bag ‘values’ of love, kindness, and wisdom. The latter becomes truly apparent thanks to its consistent smartphone and tablet experience. It has been acknowledged that “buying but busy” is a thing for millennial mothers and bagged a blinder in the process.

A skilled ecommerce website service can create a website that looks excellent and encourages the customer throughout the buying journey from beginning to end, by placing design elements like Call to Action buttons in the ideal places on the page. The designer can also ensure your website is SEO-friendly enough by optimizing each page’s design and code structure for speed, creating the page layouts to be responsive on mobile gadgets, and enforcing further enhancements like Google AMP index which increases loading speed on mobile. A great ecommerce website provider solves the problem of catching the eyes of customers and search engine at the same time.

With solid experience and capabilities in ecommerce development, CO-WELL Asia is ready to take on challenges and be the drive behind your enterprise’s success.