Did you know that the Australian eCommerce Industry has grown to $32B. Globally, eCommerce is a multi-trillion dollar industry. If you’re interested in getting your piece of this ever-expanding pie, now is the time – but you have to do it right, or the battle-hardened competition will leave you in the dust. Here are 7 Devastating eCommerce Web Design Mistakes to Avoid.
One of the essential elements of any successful eCommerce business is its web design. If it’s poor, they’re almost doomed to fail because customers expect increasingly prettier, more functional websites. It’s not 2003 anymore.
Today we’re going to discuss seven web design flaws that can devastate an otherwise successful eCommerce business.
Ready to take some notes? Let’s dig in:
7 Devastating eCommerce Web Design Mistakes to Avoid
- Limited or Difficult to Find Product Information
- Underdeveloped or Poor Customer Service Page
- Conflicting Color Schemes or Other Design Elements
- Poor or Messy Visual Hierarchy
- Painful or Confusing Signup Forms
- Visual Clutter
- Confusing, Slow, or Otherwise Poor Checkout Experience
1. Limited or Difficult to Find Product Information
Insufficient product information is usually caused by one of two problems:
- There simply isn’t enough descriptive copy about the product.
- “fancy” designs obscure the copy, such as drop downs or excessive “read more” buttons.
The bottom line is that visitors expect clear-cut and detailed information about the product they’re considering purchasing. Think about your buying habits: would you buy something based on a grainy JPG image, or would you want to know more about it? What features does it have? What benefits does it offer you?
Avoid this mistake by providing your visitors with enough information and easy access to that information.
2. Underdeveloped or Poor Customer Service Page
Your customer service or “contact support” page should be designed with one thing in mind: conveying trust to your visitors. Your contact information should be front-and-centre, making potential customers feel you’ll welcome their concerns with open arms.
Similar support-focused pages, such as pages that describe shipping returns, or payments, should be similarly clean and clear.
3. Conflicting Color Schemes or Other Design Elements
As eCommerce websites grow, they tend to accrue new pages, plugins, and other well-intentioned additions. While these additions aren’t inherently bad, regular design maintenance of the site should be conducted to ensure that they aren’t interfering with the overall design of the site. Design elements like colour schemes, image placement, page width, and so on shouldn’t be affected.
You’ve worked hard to establish your brand, so don’t let the extras take over.
4. Poor or Messy Visual Hierarchy
In design-speak, a visual hierarchy is the order of on-page elements that tend to draw the eye first. These elements should be placed so that the viewer naturally progresses from one to the next.
Parts of the visual hierarchy might include the product name, an image of the product, the product description, and your purchase Call to Action (CTA).
Without a better phrase, if these elements are “out of whack,” you’re more or less leaving money on the table.
5. Painful or Confusing Signup Forms
The signup form is usually the last step for new customers before finalizing a purchase. The signup form should be carefully designed to look good and have a certain logic and flow. Don’t try to gather too much information from your visitors because it might turn them off – spend time considering how much you need.
From a design perspective, successful signup for screams “minimalism.”
6. Visual Clutter
Some of these points have discussed the drawbacks of providing potential customers with too little information. Trying to cram too much information onto the page is just as bad.
Begin amending this problem by considering how you might be able to streamline the different page categories on your site (e.g., informational pages, product pages, and so on). If you have multi-product pages, don’t try to stuff too many on a single page.
Final tip: white space is your friend.
7. Confusing, Slow, or Otherwise Poor Checkout Experience
Have you ever been to the grocery store to pick up a handful of items and find that there’s only one checker working and a long line ahead of you?
You groan and consider how badly you need that half-gallon of milk.
A poorly designed checkout experience on an eCommerce website is the digital equivalent of that situation, with one major difference: it’s a lot easier to close an internet browser than it is to abandon your groceries in the middle of an aisle.
Checkout pages should be designed to smoothly guide your customer from their cart to receive an order confirmation in their inbox. Simplified designs that don’t distract from the task at hand – giving you a sale – and straightforward buttons are a mainstay of eCommerce checkout design.
Are You Ready to Skyrocket Your eCommerce Sales?
As we’ve discussed here today, design elements are of vital importance to the success of your eCommerce business. The trained experts at Pixel Fish have years of experience creating websites that aren’t just beautiful; they’re income-generating assets.
If you’re ready to take your sales to the next level, increase customer satisfaction, and have a thriving business that works for you day and night, we’d love to start a conversation with you.
Take your online store business to the next level with a Pixel Fish Ecommerce Website
Check out some of our latest Ecommerce Website Design projects.
Further Information:
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