subject: Mistakes to Avoid in Your E-commerce Website [print this page] Mistakes to Avoid in Your E-commerce Website
Mistakes to Avoid in Your E-commerce Website
Whether you designed it yourself, purchased a template, or hired someone to develop an e-commerce website for your retail business, it should be professional looking, easy-to-navigate, and content rich. The website should be hosted with a reputable source, with little downtime and reliable technical support. The website must also be secure as it will need to collect personal and financial information from customers.
As you begin to plan the e-commerce website on paper, you need to first define the purpose and goals for the site. Then, develop a strategic plan and design the site accordingly. The website's purpose, whether it's to gather leads or sell products, should drive the design of the pages. Ask yourself these question to help you in your e-commerce planning:
Who is your target audience?
How will the site be navigated?
What graphics, fonts, and colors will the site use?
How will you design the site for different browsers/customers?
How will you optimize the site for the search engines?
What content will the website offer?
How will you build trust and convey credibility?
How will you deliver your products to customers?
What methods of payment will you accept and how will you process payments?
What steps will you take to keep customer information safe and secure?
How will you drive traffic to your site?
How will you market your website and products?
Planning an e-commerce website is very similar to writing a business plan. The objective is to identify the focus of the website, the needs of the customer and what the competition is doing online. From there, you can begin to design and develop a solid e-commerce website. To effectively sell online, an e-commerce website should be appealing to the shopper and very simple to use. Retailers want the website to flow so that it easily guides visitors through the sales process.
Avoid these pitfalls when designing and developing an e-commerce website.
No Contact Info: Offer visitors multiple ways to connect to you. Retailers should prominently display phone number, fax number, email or contact form and store location.
Too Many Fonts and Colors: At most, use two to three fonts and colors per page. A distracting design may not compliment the products and could confuse shoppers.
Inadequate Photos: Poor product photos or photos that do not offer users the ability to enlarge the image close-up view are unacceptable on an e-commerce website. Seeing a tiny detail or assessing a texture can give shoppers the confidence they need to place an order online.
Outdated Information: Attracting and keeping website visitors means continually adding new information (i.e. latest news), deleting irrelevant, outdated information and removing broken links.
Disabling the Back Button: All this accomplishes is getting viewers annoyed.
Slow Loading Pages: E-commerce sites with large images and many products should beware of slow loading pages. Shared hosting can slow a server and give the impression of an unprofessional site.
No Search Function: Being able to search a site is a fundamental component of the visitor's experience.
Browser Incompatibility: Retailers may be losing customers if pages are not compatible to the browsers most people are using.
Orphan Pages: Create a sitemap to compile a list of all the site's pages and be sure to link to the sitemap from every page in your store.
Graphics-Only Pages: Search engines understand text, not graphics. If a website contains lots of graphics but little text, it is unlikely to get high placement in search engines.
An e-commerce website will be the most important part of your online image and should reflect the same high standards as your retail shop. There are many mistakes amateur website builders make when developing websites. The time spent learning how to build a website could cost far more than hiring a professional to develop your store's online presence.
