How To Design A Successful E-Commerce Website

The golden rule of website design is this: visitors to your site should be able to find what they are looking for as easily and quickly as possible.

Now that might sound simple but when you have an e-commerce website with a wide range of products, enabling people to find what they want will need some careful planning.

So let's assume that you have lots of products and lots of different people visiting your website - how do you know what they want? You could guess - pick a handful of products at random and display them on the home page in the hope that these are the products that most people are looking for. Or you could choose the products that you would be most likely to buy.

Unfortunately both these plans are likely to fail. What you need is a structured, targeted approach.

Step 1 Identify the key products in your range that will be most likely to sell. These could be the same products that other people sell but you are offering them at a much-reduced price, or they could be unique products that nobody else can provide. These products will usually represent the core of your business and you will no doubt have already done your market research to identify them.

Step 2 Optimise your website for the keywords and key phrases that relate to these core products. Let's say that you sell jars of honey and you've managed to buy a bulk load of eucalyptus honey that nobody else is selling online. Optimise your site for words and phrases like 'honey', 'eucalyptus honey', 'flavoured honey', 'buy honey online' and so on - it doesn't matter if you sell jams and chutneys as well, at this stage what's important is that you focus your optimisation in one key area. Once you have built up a good customer base you can begin to branch out and optimise your website for other key phrases as well, but if you try to do this too soon you may find that you are spreading yourself too thinly and that your efforts are not bearing fruit.

Step 3 Make sure that the products you feature on your home page are the ones you identified in step 1 and optimised for in step 2. In our example scenario the first thing I would want to see on arrival at your website would be a nice big picture of a jar of eucalyptus honey along with a simple statement that tells me why I should buy from you - this is where your Customer Confidence Points come in.

Customer Confidence - Trust is the Key

When people arrive at your website there are two objectives you need to address: firstly you need to convince them to buy the products you have for sale; secondly you need to convince them to buy those products from you and not go elsewhere for them.

Selling the product is relatively easy - make sure you have good clear product images (both thumbnail and enlarged images) and make sure you provide a clear, accurate and easy-to-read description. Far too many people rush this part and content themselves with copying and pasting a description from the manufacturer's website or from another site - take the time to format your description properly using paragraphs, tables and bullet point lists as appropriate. There's nothing more off-putting than seeing a mass of small text in one long paragraph. Remember: reading text on a screen is tiring, so break it up into manageable chunks.

Once you have written your product description, ask yourself if you have managed to get across all the features and benefits of that product. Using our example of a jar of eucalyptus honey we could say one of its features is its distinctive taste and the benefit to the customer is that it will give him or her a totally new taste sensation, as well as being a healthier alternative to sugar.

Having promoted the product you now need to promote your company as the only place I should be thinking of buying this product from. Now different people will look for different indicators when assessing whether they should buy here or elsewhere, so you will need to try to cover all options.

Some people will look to see what kind of guarantees you provide and what your returns policy is like, so make sure these are clearly displayed on your site. Others will look to see if you have a price promise or any multi-buy offers, so careful consideration should be given to these as well. But probably the most important factor when seeking to build confidence in your company is that of delivery.

Instant Gratification

We live in a world where we have become accustomed to being able to get what we want very quickly. Gone are the days of saving up for months to buy something we've set our heart on - if we want it we buy it and, if needs be, pay for it later.

So let's assume that I've been browsing the Internet, arrive at your site and see this fantastic picture of a jar of eucalyptus honey. You've told me how good value it is and why it would be good for me to buy it. You've made me want it. I add a jar to my shopping cart and proceed to the checkout, only to find that you're telling me I need to allow 14 days for delivery. That's no good to me - you've enticed me to buy something, now you need to put it into my hands as quickly as possible. If I think I'm going to have to wait a long time before it's delivered, one of several things could happen: I might decide I can't wait that long and try to buy it elsewhere - even if I don't find another store selling the same product, don't assume I'll come back to your site to buy it because you've lost my confidence and I don't like waiting; alternatively I might order the product but change my mind before it arrives and cancel the order.

The two golden rules of delivery are these:

• Display your delivery charges and options clearly and concisely on your website before you get to the checkout. Enticing someone to the checkout and then springing a hefty delivery charge on them may bring you a few one-off orders but it won't help to build customer confidence and you will be less likely to get repeat custom.
• Give your customers a range of delivery options including same day and next day delivery. I can't emphasise this point enough - give customers the option to pay a little extra for a quicker delivery. This may seem bizarre but some customers will pay more for delivery than for the product itself if it means it will arrive same day or next day. Your website may have done an excellent job of telling me all I need to know about a product and convincing me to buy it, but if you can't deliver it quickly there is a good chance I will go somewhere else to buy it if it means I can have it more quickly - even if it costs me more money.

Search and Navigation

Once you have optimised your site for your key products it almost goes without saying that you should tailor any advertising or sponsored link campaigns to be targeted towards those products in particular.

But you still need to bear in mind that not all visitors to your site will be looking for those products. To enable people to find any product in your store quickly and easily you will need to provide adequate navigation and searching facilities.

Some people are very visually oriented and will instinctively look for a picture of the product they are looking for. Others will want to navigate to their chosen product range using the menu (a word of warning here: it may seem a novel idea to put the menu on the right hand side of the page but most people will intuitively look to the left for it and if they don't see it you are most likely to end up with frustrated and non-buying visitors. This is a classic example of how innovative design can interfere with functionality). Some people however will insist on using a search box to find what they want. Research has shown that a fair number of people are likely to abandon a site altogether if there is no search facility.

So in order to cover all bases and cater for all types of people you should have the following:

• Basic search facility with an optional link to an advanced search (this should be in an obvious place on every page of your site).
• A clear and well-organised navigation menu on the left hand side of each page.
• Product or section images in a prominent position on your homepage linking through to your main products or product sections.

Wrapping Things Up

Having covered all the basics of setting up your online shopping website, you can now turn your attention to those extra touches that will really make you stand out from the crowd. If appropriate you could offer a gift-wrapping service or even discounts for people who spend over a certain amount.

If you have a newsletter then ask your customers when they check out if it's ok to put them on your mailing list.

Last but not least, if someone can't find what he or she wants on your site for the simple reason that you don't stock it, make it as easy as possible for him or her to contact you and ask if you can help. It may also be worth adding a note to your site to the effect that you will try to order any product that you don't hold in stock. Everybody loves good customer service and we all appreciate it when someone is prepared to go the extra mile to help us.