Top 10 e-commerce Design Principles for a Successful Website

By admin, 15 February, 2017

Online shopping has become an integral part of the life nowadays. With the facility of getting the products delivered at your doorstep, the eCommerce websites are gaining popularity with each passing day. The availability of most of the products online is making the earnings difficult for the retail shop owners. This has compelled the retailers to shift their focus to the eCommerce platforms and reach out to maximum customers via their online presence. What is the first thing that you notice about a website? The answer is – Design. No matter how well your website functions or how good your products are, the first point of focus should be the design and layout. We all know about the intensifying competition in the world of eCommerce. Hence, to attract the visitors and make them browse through the products on your site, the design and interface should be striking enough to take hold of their attention instantly.

Internet users are smart enough to differentiate between an authentic or high-quality website and a bad one. The statistics show that more than 80% of the online population has ordered something through eCommerce websites, out of which, over 50% people have bought the products more than once. Let us identify the requirements and principles of eCommerce website design so that you can generate maximum revenue out of them.

1. User Friendliness

An eCommerce website should be easy to navigate. An easy search process allows the users to reach various pages or products; they desire to buy. These websites should also provide the visitors with ample details and pictures of the products so that they can understand the products well, without touching or seeing them in real. The more realistic it looks, the better are your chances of getting a conversion.

2. Unique Design Elements

Seeing the tough competition in the eCommerce niche, it becomes imperative that you stand out different from your online rivals. The market is full of buying alternatives, and there should be a strong reason why a user must pick you over other adversaries. An inventive design will compel the visitors to browse through your site and offers you a chance to impress your consumers effortlessly. Remember, the first impression is of utmost importance.

To make the buyers notice you among the flock, you should implement some bold and unusual components in your design so that they remember you for long, and visit your site again to experience a unique user interface. The site should be designed in such a way that it serves the purposes of the users, looks eye-catching and focuses on the products. People, who are a novice to online shopping, sometimes tend to shift their focus towards an attractive looking design only.

You have to keep in mind that designing has its own importance in bringing the users to your website, but the product quality is also significant. You can also take the help of experienced web designers to make your website look more professional.

3. Emphasize on Security

Each person, who is opting to buy products from your website, needs assurance that his/her personal and financial details are safe and that you are not going to share them with any third party. Make sure that your payment gateway is safe and secure, failing to which will directly affect your leads and sign ups, ultimately resulting in hammering your sales targets badly.

4. Responsive Technology

Some designers tend to use heavy HTML coding, large-sized images, and big flash files to improve the design and look of the website. But, it is not favorable for an eCommerce site in any way, as it will make the website slow to load. You cannot afford to have a slow loading site as there are thousands of other competitors on the web selling similar products. People are not patient enough to wait for your pages to load and will quickly switch to other possible choices. Having a non-responsive website will definitely affect your business and make you lose potential clients.

5. Know Your Target Audience

You should know your customers well and design your website accordingly, to serve them better. You have to understand what they necessitate so that you can make them feel at ease while browsing through your products and provide them with your services to win their trust.

You have to identify your target audience and keep a check on their buying patterns. This way, you would be able to enhance their user experience, which would directly perk up your revenue generation.

6. Add Search Column

The search option is indispensable for every eCommerce website, as the visitors might be looking for a particular product that they need to buy. Going through various categories and looking for a specific product might become a tedious task. Therefore, instead of making the users get lost in the multitude of categories and filters, you can allow them to browse the product directly by just typing the name and jumping to the relevant search results.

7. Effective Product Descriptions

Product descriptions on your site are very crucial and can influence your buyer’s purchasing verdicts. The more alluring the fonts, descriptive text, images, and videos are, the better the buyer will relate it to his buying needs. This is not essentially a part of design, yet paying attention to these details can definitely increase your ROI in the long run.

8. Minimalistic Layout

Minimalism in the design is the best way to emphasize on simplicity and remove the redundant elements from the site. Getting minimalism right can be a bit fiddly, nonetheless. Carefully selected color palette, ample white space, attractive typography, and above all, deciding on choosing the right design elements and leaving out the unimportant ones are some of the key factors that will direct your users exactly where they intend to go.

Moreover, minimalist sites are often faster to develop, claim fewer resources, and load much faster than those cluttered eCommerce websites.

9. Consistent Branding

Following the brand identity throughout your site and keeping it consistent all the way can help the users distinguish your store’s brand values and exclusive offerings. You must ensure that the font, brand-specific color palette, tone of product photographs, descriptive texts, call to action buttons, and every element and style used in the design is strictly following the eccentricity of your brand. This will also help you build a strong brand-customer relationship with your regular clients.

10. Efficient Call to Action

The ultimate goal of your website is to increase the conversion rate and generate more revenue, and thus, CTAs play a vital role here. No matter how bold and intuitive your CTA is, if it carries a below average copy, it won’t work well. The audience has come to your site seeking a solution; thus, ensure that the words used on the call to action buttons are catered towards the probable questions they have in mind and take them to exactly what they are looking for. In order to create highly efficient CTAs, make sure that the words used are highly focused towards action driven verbs. Some examples of such trigger words that will drive your users to click on them are – “Join Now,” “Get Instant Access,”, “Claim Your Discount,” etc.

At the end of the day; however, even the most compelling copy won’t boost the conversion rates if you have a petite call to action button which gets blended with the other elements on your site. To make your CTAs achieve higher CTRs, contrasting colors play a significant role. So, whether you use a vibrant red, blue or other highlighted effect on the call to action button, make sure that it is impossible to miss for the user.

Conclusion

Just like the abundant retail stores, there are uncountable eCommerce websites on the world wide web. But, as one prefers to go to some specific stores while shopping, the same applies to online purchasing too. Thus, no matter how smart your marketing strategies are, you won't be able to engage your audiences unless your eCommerce storefront doesn't have a groovy layout.

Therefore, the importance of a catchy design for your eCommerce site can't be denied. So, apart from showcasing a wide range of products, keeping the checkout process seamless, and including proper search options throughout the site, pay proper heed to your web store's design too. That's your first impression on the user. The easier your site appears to your audiences, the better it is for your business. Do provide your valuable feedback and keep visiting us. Cheers!

Author Bio
This article is written by Garvit Narang who works as a website designer at Skylark Infotech. He loves to express his knowledge about web designing and related topics through his posts. He has been working with a skilled team of professionals, which has enabled him to learn and share his experience on this platform.