10 UX Tips For Your Next eCommerce Website

‘Redesign, Rebuild, Reinvigorate’

This is the secret that every dynamic eCommerce store employ to climb the mountain that is called “Success”. A successful business understands the need of the potential customers and adapts to it.

Redefining your online store’s user experience is a powerful element that is crucial for adaptation. For an effective online store, you must prove immaculate user experience.

User experience (UX) is one of the most important things for online visitors as well as getting a good ranking in Search Engines. Some stores struggle to find the right balance between convoluted and great UX design, while others simply don’t know what the best course of action is.

Here are 10 UX tips to help you when you are thinking of redesigning your eCommerce site.

1. Users First

The first thing that should always be kept in mind while redesigning UX is that it is the users who matter the most. Instead of going for what feels and looks good to you, go for how it will appeal to your target customer base.

Data-driven marketing technique, creating buyer personas, exploring the market, and analyzing top competitors; these are the right ways to move forward.

Adopting these strategies will allow you to better understand what the users’ perception. Even though these methods are time-consuming, they are worth every bit.

2. Keep Homepage Light

The homepage is the first thing that users usually see when they visit your online store. It is the window which shows what you have to offer.

eCommerce sites have a lot of products to offer. There’s also discounts, special items and so on. All of the things that you want your customers to see at a first glance.

According to a study conducted by Google, visitors form an opinion about a site in less than 50 milliseconds. So if you fill your homepage to the brim with ineffective contents, you are very likely to tip the scale of user ‘gut feeling’ on the wrong side.

The key is giving visitors only a taste of what you have. Entice their shopping senses by displaying only your special attractions and mega discounts.

3. Quick View of Product

As stated before, most eCommerce websites host a lot of products in their store. A user doesn’t have the time to click on every product that is within the desired category.

People go to online shopping for fast and easy purchase. So it makes sense that if you provide users with the ability to get a quick view of the products. It can enhance their shopping experience and take on the next level.

By allowing users to hover over any product and get a glimpse of the product description enables them to quickly sort through the products and make a purchase.

Having to click on each and every product will only frustrate users. This simple UX trick will relieve them from being annoyed. Not to mention that they will be more likely to visit your site more frequently.

4. Advanced Filtering

Unless you are a very small eCommerce store that only caters to a limited niche, there’s a good chance that you host more than a hundred products in your store. And if you are even a medium sized store, there can be thousands of products.

Just sorting them according to general categories like TV, Phone, and Small Appliances isn’t enough. Users need advanced filters to find their specific product more easily. The customers don’t want to go through too many hoops to find what they are looking for.

5. Animations

There is one thing that never fails to dazzle people, Animation. The power of motion has always been captivating. They provide a sense of excitement. They are great tools to attract the weary eyes of a visitor.

A simple fade-in animation of the drop down many can be aesthetically pleasing instead of an abrupt one.

Adding small animations to different aspects throughout your site will only enhance the richness of the user experience.

6. Display Valuable Information

One of the major issues people have with online shopping is trust. And building trust, especially in the initial stages is no easy task.

Having everything in open helps in building that trust. When a potential buyer sees that you have laid out the shipping information, return policy and detailed product description very clearly; it gives points to trust factor.

This is important for delivering expected user experience. Users expect that a trustful online store will have this information. By meeting their expectation, you are cementing yourself as the go-to shop for online purchase.

7. Infinite Scrolling

There have been countless times where I found a product that piqued my interest but lost it among the sea of merchandise, an eCommerce store sells.

Having to browse page after page only to forget which page had the product you liked is very irritating. More often than not, this event leads us to abandon our intention to purchase.

However, if users can scroll as much as they want and still be on the same page eliminates the need for unnecessary browsing.

They can simply use the ‘find’ option on their browser to locate the product using the keyword. This can be a huge time saver and pleasing to the eyes.

8. Simple Checkout

As more time passes, our sense of logic and responsibility kicks in. This, in turn, prevents us from purchasing giant TVs on a whim.

I’m kidding of course.

However, there is some truth to the previous line. The longer it takes for users to add a product to the cart and check out, the probability that they will decide to desert that cart increases.

As an eCommerce store owner, you don’t want the checkout process to be something out of an Indiana Jones movie. You want a clear, concise and simple process that encourages the buyer.

9. Total Responsiveness

A large part of visitors uses mobile devices to access eCommerce sites. If your site isn’t mobile responsive, then you’ll definitely lose a lot of potential customers.

Any non-responsiveness on any part of the site will reduce that site’s credibility. For example, if the buyer is using a mobile device and finds that your product pages are not responsive, they will quickly decide to leave.

Faulty design of the site will drive away potential buyers en masse. Implementing a UX research strategy focused on mobile usability ensures that every aspect of your online store is fully responsive and meets the needs of mobile users.

The best thing that you can do to ensure that visitors have tip-top user experience is to make sure that each and every part of your online store is responsive.

10. Don’t Forget SEO

SEO can often be forgotten, and little thought is put into it when rebuilding your eCommerce site. Sure, it’s not directly related to UX, none-the-less it’s crucial for a revamped site.

Your store needs to be search engine optimized so that people can locate it and make a purchase. If there isn’t any user on the site, then there is no user experience to talk of.

Your web design strategy must incorporate SEO. The content of the site should be well optimized, adding value to your products and the site.

Wrapping Up

Knowledge is powerful, and having the right tip at the right time can be the key to success. To keep up with the changing world and the changing needs, you must reinvent and redesign your store.

With these 10 UX tips, you are well equipped to tackle your next eCommerce website redesign instead of site redesign and venture forth.