How to Increase Conversions for E-commerce Websites

By Beacon News | Published December 3, 2010 | Categories: Digital Marketing

Having great products does not always ensure that they will sell on a websites.  Listed below are some best practices to  guide your visitors in the right direction.  Remember that your e-commerce site is not an online catalog, but rather a place for visitors to learn more about your company and to engage with your products  interactively.  In order for any company  to sell merchandise or a concept on the web, demonstrating credibility and earning trust are absolutely essential.  Visitors are most comfortable when they believe asite is secure and/or offers an excellent warranty; therefore, such information should be highly visible.Building trust from better known brands through testimonials and such are also effective measures and make visitors feel that much safer..   For most e-commerce websites, the three most important types of pages are the homepage, the category pages, and the product detail page.

Best Practices for the Homepage

• Remember: the primary purpose of your homepage is to provide a means for visitors to navigate themselves.
• Do not develop the entire site in flash.
• Do not provide too many choices for customers.
• Do not bog crowd the page with too many promotions that distract visitors, and  do not make the primary focus rely too heavily on one product's promotion if the company carries several lines. This advice is to prevent visitors from becoming confused and/or distracted; consequently, they may neglect to view the full line of products and such. A good example would involve sales of clothing for the entire family, but having only one image of boys' jeans listed on sale. Better conversions would occur if new new visitors could easily identify that the product line extends beyond boys' denim; the visitor can find items for the entire family.

Best Practices for the Category Pages

• People tend to process images seven times faster than they do words, so use images to divide your categories or different product lines within your categories.
• Try not to place  too much content on these pages; save it for the product detail pages.

Best Practices for the Product Detail Pages

• Make sure there is a clear call to action.
• Provide enough detail for customers to feel comfortable about purchasing products on the spot.
• Use high quality images
• Take advantage of social pushes (the Facebook "like" buttons, a share button, etc) to move items infectiously by gaining exposure with large numbers of viewers.
• Though users are more comfortable using their scroll bars, 76% of all clicks are still above the fold; therefore, make sure to position major calls to action above the fold.